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THE AMERICAN 
WOOL MANUFACTURE 


VOLUME I 


Ae Vina fol a ete ee Abd a '- 
ay Fen . ie 


i ay 








an | 
LONDON : HUMPHREY MILFC 
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS. 





syjasnyoesseyy] “aaopuy yIJON ‘kuvdwos suryseyy Jaqiny 2 stavq ey} Jo Juv{d 94} Ye poadsosoid si ouIySvU oy], 


duvo ATHIVTIOHOS TIVNIOTYO FHL 





THE AMERICAN 
WOOL MANUFACTURE 


BY 


ARTHUR HARRISON COLE, Pu.D. 


ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS AND TUTOR IN THE DIVISION OF HISTORY, 
GOVERNMENT, AND ECONOMICS, HARVARD UNIVERSITY 


VOLUME I 






ha 
bi 


mY 
Il 


q 


CAMBRIDGE 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
1926 


PHILADELPHIA BOOK COMPAI Ns 


22 Worth Ninth Sire 





_ COPYRIGHT, 1926 ei 
__ BY HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS _ 
; i 
4 


Leal ‘e #8 eee o 
Raa 3 bh Ke wt 


4 La * * e e®* 





MY WIFE 





PREPACE 


AMERICAN industrial experience contains few chapters so rich 
in material illustrative of our whole industrial advance as the 
development of the domestic wool manufacture. Not only does 
that development cover an exceptionally long period in our in- 
dustrial history, going back as it does to the primitive cloth 
manufacture of the early colonial days, but it has often under- 
gone in heightened force vicissitudes of circumstance which we 
have come to recognize as characteristic of American industrial 
progress. The youthful colonial manufacture of wool was the 
first such manufacture to incur the displeasure and to come under 
the prohibitive ban of the British government. It soon felt the 
abnormal boom and subsequent reaction which accompanied and 
followed intra-imperial friction and war; and with each later war, 
it went through a similar but more pronounced disturbance. 
Again, in the difficulty of securing suitable raw material, of at- 
tracting a satisfactory labor supply, and of selecting an advan- 
tageous line of production, the wool manufacture on the factory 
basis was handicapped in a special degree. The process of ac- 
climatization was slow and arduous, and not until the third or 
fourth decade of the last century could it be said to have been 
accomplished. Then, in later years came the attainment of 
really large-scale production, — when individual plants for the 
working of wool equaled or exceeded those of any other textile 
industry, —and the amalgamation of separate concerns into 
sizable combinations or consolidations. With all this progress, 
too, has gone a particularly close relationship between the 
domestic industry and the tariff, from the time when the 
manufacture secured marked attention in the early protectionist 
movement, including a place of distinction in the “Tariff of 
Abominations,” to that when the wool and woolens schedule, 
Schedule K, was widely regarded as ‘‘the keystone of protec- 
tion.” In short, the evolution of the American wool manu- 


facture may be studied as a particularly clear and sometimes 
vil 


Vili PREFACE 


even an exaggerated reflection of the entire domestic industrial 
advance. 

But the history of the domestic wool-manufacturing industry 
contains treasures of its own. For example, it presents a specially 
interesting and instructive sequence of industrial forms. This 
sequence has significance to the student of economic history as 
much by what it lacks as by what it contains, while the differ- 
ences between the course of advance here and that which foreign 
wool manufactures followed give additional flavor. Of the stages 
of industrial development generally recognized, — household, 
handicraft, domestic or putting-out, and factory, — two played 
relatively small part in the American development. The handi- 
craft system, for instance, was represented in the colonial period 
only by specialized weavers, fullers, and worsted-cloth makers 
and, in the subsequent half-century, only by the proprietors of 
combined carding-fulling shops and by a few small-scale woolen- 
cloth manufacturers. The putting-out system also was of little 
consequence. Indeed, this latter organization of production, so 
important in English history, can hardly be said to have raised © 
its head in the United States. On the other hand, the household 
method of operation had a strikingly long and vigorous career. 
It was to be found, of course, in the earliest colonial settlements, 
and with the steady westward expansion of the area of settle- 
ment it appeared in a continuing repetition of the eastern ex- 
perience. Improvement of transportation facilities led in time 
to a decrease in the domain of household production; and this 
same force, to be sure, had the effect of shortening the period of 
household manufacture in the western areas. But not until the 
frontier had disappeared did the last vestiges of this industrial 
form also vanish. Again, the household method of production 
melted into the factory system in a series of interesting steps. 
The fulling mill, ancillary to family manufacture, acquired the 
newly-imported carding machine; the carding-fulling shop be- 
came the nucleus of factory development; the half-formed fac- 
tory depended upon household workers for certain aid, as in the 
weaving of factory-made yarns; the youthful mill took commis- 
sion work from household producers for one, several, or all the 


PREFACE 1x 


processes of manufacture; until finally the factory was able to 
make its way without such assistance, producing for a distant, 
impersonal market. Such a course of development is, as far as 
I know, unique in industrial history. 

With respect to a second point the rise of the domestic wool 
manufacture is particularly noteworthy, — the character of its 
technological development. The initial equipment of the Ameri- 
can production was altogether English. For the colonial times 
this is, of course, merely what would be expected. But it is 
interesting to note that despite the British restrictions of later 
years upon the exportation of machinery, plans of machinery, 
and upon the emigration of expert workmen, the movement of 
importation continued. As far as one can ascertain, the English 
discoveries and inventions were all brought to this country with 
greater or less promptitude. Then, — a second feature of note, 
— the American industry starting with this foreign-made outfit 
went forward independently of any progress abroad until for 
the woolen branch of the industry it had secured a complement 
of power-driven, quasi-automatic apparatus which, at least at 
the time of its evolution, was superior to contemporary foreign 
equipment. Of special importance was the revolutionary change 
in carding machinery, the invention of the so-called ‘‘ American 
card” or ‘‘carde Américaine,” which set this woolen production 
upon a new course of advance. Striking independent progress 
in the technological field such as the American wool manufacture 
showed in its earlier days is, I believe, rarely to be found in 
domestic experience. 

But this early woolen advance has not persisted. Indeed, 
with it the degree and rapidity of technical progress during more 
recent decades in this branch of the industry, and the technical 
situation that has confronted the worsted-cloth manufacture 
throughout its whole career in the United States, present rather 
sharp contrasts. As for the former, advances have been pro- 
gressively less significant as the years have gone by, until recently 
improvement has chiefly taken the form of refinements upon 
existing mechanisms, coming either from within the domestic 
industry or from abroad. In the worsted manufacture, —a 


xX PREFACE 


manufacture which on a factory basis goes back in this country 
only about seventy-five years,— a complete equipment of well- 
developed, quasi-automatic machinery was originally borrowed 
from abroad, and, since its introduction here, it has undergone 
scarcely any important improvement in type. To be sure, 
certain apparatus for use in processes auxiliary to the main 
manufacturing operations have been introduced and, as in the 
woolen branch, much progress has been made in the perfection of 
preéxisting machinery. Moreover, with regard to both woolen 
and worsted machinery, one should note the recent advent 
of the automatic loom, —a significant exception to the state- 
ments just made. Though this mechanism does in fact 
promise less for the wool-manufacturing industry than a similar 
machine has already accomplished for the allied cotton- 
cloth manufacture, and indeed has made little progress in 
the woolen branch of the former industry, still it must be 
viewed as a notable improvement. On the whole, however, 
marked changes and conspicuous advances have been rare 
during recent decades in the mechanical equipment of either the 
woolen or worsted manufactures. In short, there appears to 
be a tendency toward stability in technological form, — observ- 
able, I believe, in other industries as well. Progress undoubt- 
edly will come in the future, but seemingly at a generally slower 
rate. The Industrial Revolution has here about spent its force. 

A third and final noteworthy lesson from the present study, — 
although scores of lesser features might be mentioned, — is that 
high quality of output and small-scale production are not always 
so inseparable as has been usually assumed to be the case. The 
type of fabric first successfully manufactured in domestic fac- 
tories was of low quality, represented by the satinet and flannel 
of the thirties. Then, with improvement in technical equipment 
and manufacturing ability came the enhancement in quality of 
the domestic output, — the production of cassimeres, fancy cas- 
simeres, worsted coatings, and the like, — until in more recent 
decades fabrics of highest grade, rivaling the best foreign goods, 
have been turned out by American mills. In all this develop- 
ment experience has shown that the most effective domestic 


PREFACE Xi 


production has been that of standardized or semi-standardized 
cloths of not above medium quality proceeding upon a large-scale 
basis. But the course of operation in the worsted dress-goods 
production has in recent years demonstrated that fabrics of the 
finest quality can be turned out in considerable volume by really 
large concerns. The small mill and quasi-handicraft methods of 
fabrication are not necessary for the production of truly fine 
goods. The peculiar conditions of the market for such goods, 
exceptionally able management of the enterprises, and a partic- 
ularly high tariff may be all necessary to the particular result. 
The development may smack of “‘growing grapes in Scotland.” 
But at least it is a rather novel situation in American or foreign 
manufacture. 


Two further matters alone deserve place among these in- 
troductory remarks: a note of warning and a note of thanks. 
The former refers to the ever-present problem of the protec- 
tive tariff and its relation to the ensuing study. ‘This history 
of the wool manufacture is not intended to cover the tariff 
question in connection with this particular industry, although 
unavoidably some aspects of that question are touched upon. 
Whether or not the tariff upon the manufactures of wool is or 
ever was justified is not a subject upon which I pretend here to 
give an adequate discussion. Only in so far as the tariff has 
been an influence, — one among several, — affecting the course 
of the industry’s development am I concerned with the tariff 
at all. I trust, however, the tariff question in regard to wool 
manufactures will be envisioned more clearly as a result of 
my investigations. 

As to the second matter, I must here acknowledge that in 
the several years during which this history has been in inter- 
mittent preparation, I have acquired obligations of greater or 
less degree in many directions. Men in the trade itself, and 
divers friends in professional life or at the United States Tariff 
Commission, have all made contributions, some of which they 
may see reproduced in the ensuing pages. I can express my 
specific indebtedness in only a few cases. My study of the 


xii PREFACE 


wool manufacture was auspiciously begun under direction of 
Professor Frank W. Taussig, progressed rapidly while I was 
working with Professor Edwin F. Gay, and bears throughout, I 
fancy,many imprints of their inspired teaching. My colleagues, 
Professors Homer B. Vanderblue and Richard S. Meriam, 
were kind enough to read all or practically all of the manu- 
script and to give me a host of valuable suggestions. Simi- 
larly, in the business world, Mr. John P. Wood was most 
unsparing of his time and energy when he read the galley 
proof of this study; and his criticisms were always illuminating. 
To the machine-builders, Davis & Furber Machine Company, 
Crompton & Knowles Loom Works, and C. G. Sargent’s Sons 
Corporation, I am indebted for many of the illustrations 
herein presented. And I would not close without expressing 
my obligation to Miss Ruth Crandall, upon whose helpful 
assistance I have leaned in the collection of much statistical 
and other material and in the detailed preparation of these 
volumes for the press. 
ARTHUR H. COLE 


CAMBRIDGE, 
November, 1925. 


CONTENTS 
VOLUME I 


PAK aL 
THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


Petre eOGMMaTIC PRODUCTION , . 0.0% 5 6 ee ee ke ee 
Ce POEMS GA re 
RRM OOUMNIDD IY 82 i Soe ee ee 
pmebecmmmcammemuipment ..9 20. 2 Ge ek 
Perot Organization ... =... 5s eee ee 

4. Extent and Quality of Colonial Production ...... 

Fam -aiomia. trade in Wool Manufactures ........ . 


ULC OU CRNMENTALUEOLICY (oo. kk ew ee te 
RCT Nena TG rk. ke a ce kee ee 
me Olotiaieincouragement;: wk. 5s hs eee ee 
ember iste reTreTerice gk ks kk ee ek ee oe 


re ere ONS eS ee kk eee ee we 
Me CNM atte hee eee 


Pa LL 
THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Peer Ary eATIEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION. |. . .... 


Wie ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT ..... 2. 2. as 
Mee seIe Te ACTING Fo oF) oa. s%. ch). ss a Hebe Wel on ies AE ee 
Me eR CRINGS 2 5 PO uke ete ees ee 
Be we aCrrines i Mer ae es er Pe eon 
BaP ACHINGL YF Sas ed ke ee ees LO ee 
MR rs Me oa fo Suh tee Waal oe themes ey shee ye 


ma B&W ND 


XIV CONTENTS 
PAGE 
VIT. EXPANSION OF THE DomeEsTIC MARKET ........%5 137 
INTRODUCTION! 205 ¥ 0s ao eS 142 
t. Importations .°.).06) 2. 230. 22 138 
Organization of the Import Trade .- 3) ert? tc 
2. Public Encouragement to the Domestic Manufacture. . 160 
VIII. DiminuTIon oF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION. ........ 175 
Household Production for Sale . 12) 33a IQI 
IX. CHANGES IN QUALITY OF DomEsTIC MANUFACTURE . ... 195 
X. DEVELOPMENT QF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES ........ 208 
AI. RisE or FACTORY PRODUCTION \) \) ]) ae 219 
1. The Development of the Factory (ae 219 
2. The Source of Capital and the Course of Profits .... 226 
3. BuSiness Organization . ...”\~ eee 
4. Labor Supply . .:. . <5) 1 2 2 233 
XII, THe FAcTorRyY IN 1830 .. 2. . 2 op 245 

1. Volume and Geographical Distribution of Factory 
Production Meee 245 
2. The Character of the Representative Establishment 253 

3. The Place of Factory Production in the Supply of the 
Domestic Market . . . 2 353 ee 258 
PART «ii 
THE MATURE FACTORY 

INTRODUCTION 2.0 2 5 6) ss 9 265 
XIII. GRowTH OF THE INDUSTRY . . 09) Spee 267 
XIV. THE DECLINE IN HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION = ee 279 
XV. CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION (7. * 286 
XVI. INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT) 03-3 nee 207 
1. Broadcloth ..0. 0) 2.0 9 300 
2. The Rise of New Woolen Cloths) 7) see 306 
3. Other Woolen Fabrics. 2...) 203) 316 
4. Worsted Fabrics .. .\\. -. eee 324 
XVII. IMPORTATIONS . 205.5 05. ton) se 336 
XVIII. TECHNICAL ADVANCE .). 5 <<) Soe eee 350 
XIX. LABOR AND LABOR CONDITIONS “<5. s) sue 368 
XX. Tae Crvin WAR PERIOD 2). Sg ee 376 
XXI. Conctuston: THE INDUSTRY IN 1876039) sees eee 389 


CONTENTS 


VOLUME II 


PART IV 
INDUSTRIAL MATURITY 


Smee OP ew Gee as |e. Pe Se ie ae” fen fe ve. fe.) eee, Oy Ce ce 


XXIT. 


XXIII. IwporTATIONS AND INTERNAL DEVELOPMENT 
SerOUreCSTOLGAMNOItAtionS . 6 ek ek ee 


2. Types and Qualities among Importations. ..... 


6 oe.) 6a es 


XXIV. 


(Te Sa Se Ce aCe ROT On Ae Bed eva Gene a Selb ee fae) 


Ct be ee a ee SE eee ee Va oes 


XV. 
XXVI. 


XXVILI. 
XXVITI. 


XXIX. 
XXX. 


XXX. 
XXXIT. 
XXXII. 


CRITICAL ANALYSIS 


APPENDIX A. 


APPENDIX B. List of Factories Started Between 1800 and 1815 
APPENDIX C. Description of Existing Processes of Manufacture . . 
Meeerorse lcm biplicarapny ~ . . . <b ae ek ke ew ee 
ER rt Se Ag ee be ee 


1. Immigration 
2. Hours of Labor 


CHANGES IN DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 
GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 


4. Changes in Quality of Production 
GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION 


LARGE-SCALE MANAGEMENT 
CONCLUSION 


APPENDICES 


Cer Gee Som het) 6 DG 16 es) 6 eh Oe) oe Ke fe)! er Ue 


Wee TIONS 0k ke we ee 


Cee e, eR ee Oe Oo eee Se pp e116 oe ee Pei Te 


iy ce te Oe vette e Coe RR mh Pe oe ee, ee, Ce es Me A 


Re ere OVET. a i le Be we we 
Pee ORM TeaZation oe 
Bo we Sfe GN, VUE TS Te 


Py ee ei La Dec SU lek ek few eC! 


Mi ee 6 ee oO Maes OL) aes Water ay |! [ey Nal ew. 


1. Expansion of the Wool Manufacture as a Whole . . 
2. Expansion of the Worsted Manufacture. .... . 
3. Experience of the Woolen Manufacture. ..... 


ee eee eh a) ee Ae ae 


Clee, Var le) (6) SP ey er crear J air) “aril aie 


Ow re PO we ee el a Oe ey Lia Pah Mena s: 
SO), Cex yey, Oo 8, Des ee, ARS 8 ST bie 


Sa ese ee kee es a a (ee Bs sets ey ey | at eee a” Keg Re 


Venere £6 wp fae; a “ie: ce! fie. “ey Mey Glee Fel er er 8 fy 7 le 


rca OOlENS ACL Of T6000 247 Ged as tal uel ees 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


VOLUME I 
PLATES 
Speer ocbomeld Card. 2. kk te Frontispiece 
fweruierone ce Nemours 2... wk ek kk ee Facing page 74 
Pearearomatiaiich OlevenS) = 60. ew ke ee we ee 74 
MEME Sr te Pe Sek ee es 102 
The Final (Finisher) Section of a Modern Carding Machine . .. . 102 
canoer ere ee eh ee 224 
eM OPO ay cs sw os ob ee we kn es 224 
EPR OnLOOMY) 2. fk kk ee 308 
The Forepart of a Double Breaker Card of the Sixties. . .... . 350 
The Finisher Section of a Carding Machine of the Sixties ..... 350 
Bitemermrinerac kK Orie rites 2 kw. ke te ee 358 
Peoatmetimioonl with Drop Boxes. . ... 2. 1 2 ee he ee 364 
ivamrow Crompton Loom of the Fifties ........: ++. 364 
Pert Powmeoceneor tne Filties ... 50.6 bk ee we 370 
FIGURES 

PAGE 
mmenide Billy (English Model). .. . 2... eh we 100 
Pu arOroevec Spinning jenny... 2. .e . e eee ee 109 
pmevoreine Patis ofa Power Loom .. ... 5 2 is ee 121 

4. Exportation of Cloths, Stuff-goods, and Kerseymeres from the 
United Kingdom to the United States, 1815-1834... .. . 150 

5. Exportation of Blankets and Flannels from the United Kingdom 
POMPUPBUILC CES ACCS@ LOI S—1834.0 20.0 ee ke eee ee OS 152 

6. Household Manufacture of Woolen Cloths in New York State, 
SOMME tas oh as k,l ge Bek SUIS Ses Bee 181 

7. Household Manufacture of Woolen Cloths in New York State, 
SE CM CMS othe a, (ai, ny SAN ete ULah E) Rhirehae ot Ue 280 
8. Working Parts of a Burr Picker as built in 1861. ....... 311 

g. Importation of Cloths and Dress-goods (in terms of value), 1820- 
res ER Nr fe eo) cere dy Pinky el eae oe me Ds 234 

10. Working Parts of a Scouring Bowl (a McNaught Model of about 
Pecisty MR ed 8 ore a, cg! elie nan ol Geucley ha ttyce ox 352 

11. Importation of Cloths and Dress-goods (in terms of value), 1859- 
eC |g aah ee RN eile) fg vats len iat inate septs cilp 383 


XVlil LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


VOLUME II 
PLATES 

William Crompton and Lucius J. Knowles ........ Frontispiece 
The Improved Broad Loom of the Seventies ...... Facing page 68 
The First Portion of a Scouring Set as built in the Seventies 80 

The Automatic Feed and the First (Breaker) Section of a present- 
day Woolen Card) 3.0. 204. 2 86 
A Woolen Mule of Recent Type. 2." 2 >.) 9) ai 90 
An Automatic Feed and First Bowl of a Modern Scouring Machine . 182 
William M. Wood .. . 2's)... ue 5) 232 

FIGURES 

PAGE 

12. Importation of Cloths and Dress-goods (in terms of quantity), 
TSO7-I90I7 6 ee we ee ae le a or 40 

13. Importation of Cloths and Dress-goods (in terms of value), 
1867-1917 2 ee ee we 41 

14. Distribution of Import Trade of Cloths, Dress-goods, and Yarns 
among the Principal European Exporting Countries 47 

15. Exportation of Woolen and Worsted Fabrics from the United 

Kingdom to the United States, 1890-1917, ,jand total Imports 
of Such Goods into the United States, -1910=102T Wu e 53 

16. The Heavy Worsted Loom as constructed by Crompton & 
Knowles in 1884 2... .. . . 2) 22 Q2 

17. The Automatic Worsted Loom as constructed by the Crompton 
& Knowles Loom Works in 1911. 3) 0 96 

18. Comparison of the Movement of Wages in the Wool Manufacture, 
Cotton Manufacture, and all Industries, 1850-1890 127 

19. Movement of Wages in the Wool and Cotton Manufactures, 
I8QO-IQI4. sg ee 128 

20. Comparison of the Movement of the Prices of Raw Wool and 

Wool Goods, and of Wages in the Wool Manufacture, 1850- 
IOIS 9. 5 se eee ave wee bene er 130 

21. Rate of Growth in the Wool and Other Chief Textile Industries 
(based on the number of employees), 1869-1919 ...... 148 

22. Rate of Growth in the Wool and Other Chief Textile Industries 
(based on the consumption of raw materials), 1869-19109 . 149 

23. Value of the Products in the Wool and Allied Manufactures, 
1859-19090 5 2 ww. De 153 

24. Production of the Various Classes of Wool Fabrics (in terms of 
quantity), 1879-19190... 2... 166 

25. Purchases of Worsted Yarn by Carpet, Knit-goods, and all Wool 


Manufactures, 1879-19019 


Ss Te A Ye ee RS BE ae 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS XIX 


PAGE 
26. Purchases of Woolen Yarns by Knit-goods, Carpet, and all Wool 


er CUtee MIO 7OI9IO! 2 fe We. ewe wk we a 8 194 
27. Average Number of Wage-Earners per Woolen Mill in the States 
with Important Woolen-Cloth Manufactures ........ 210 


28. Average Number of Wage-Earners per Worsted Mill in the States 
with Important Worsted-Cloth Manufactures ....... 212 





THE AMERICAN 
WOOL MANUFACTURE 


VoLuME I 


1 oli 
THE COLONIAL PERIOD 





CHAPTER I 
THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 


INTRODUCTION 


OnE of the characteristics of the wool manufacture which has 
differentiated it from the manufacture of most other textile fibers 
has been its intimate connection, in temperate climates, with eco- 
nomically undeveloped regions. In the period when commercial 
operations both within and between countries were narrowly con- 
fined, the substantially self-dependent families of such primitive 
communities spun the wool of their own sheep and wove it 
into cloth. In the remote or economically poor regions of the 
world similar phenomena may be observed even at the pres- 
ent day, although of course the improved transportation facili- 
ties and the eagerness of the industrially advanced countries to 
exchange manufactured goods for the crude products of the back- 
ward areas have narrowly restricted the scope of such household 
activities. 

Now this peculiarity of the wool manufacture in so many parts 
of the world has been of particular importance in the American de- 
velopment. Primitive conditions occasioned the early appearance 
of household wool-working in the colonies; and the long-continued 
movement of settlement was responsible for the persistence of 
household wool manufacture in some parts of the country for many 
decades, — until the frontier had disappeared. Moreover, even 
today, in the most secluded hamlets of the agricultural and lumber- 
ing districts, family production with the spinning wheel and hand- 
loom may be found, though to be sure this form of production is 
essentially a relic of bygone days. For the colonial period, how- 
ever, the characteristic of wool-working above mentioned was 
of special significance. From the earliest years, even through the 
Revolution, it played the dominant part in the history of the wool 
manufacture. 


4 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


The beginnings of the wool manufacture in this country came 
with the earliest settlements. Of the Pilgrim Fathers, William 
White, Robert Cushman, and Richard Masterson are said to have 
been wool-combers or carders;! then, in 1643, some twenty or more 
families from the cloth-manufacturing section of Yorkshire, Eng- 
land, came to reside in the town of Rowley, in Massachusetts Bay, 
where they attracted attention by their proficiency in the produc- 
tion of woolen cloths.? This settlement in Rowley is also noteworthy 
in that here for the first time in this country a fulling mill, there- 
after the usual complement of the household production, was set 
up, the gearing having been brought from England. But such de- 
tails of the commencement in manufacture are of more interest to 
the antiquarian than to the student of the industry in its larger as- 
pects. We need note merely that the growth of the earlier colonies 
and the establishment of additional ones were accompanied by the 
extension of the wool manufacture on the household system and 
the distribution of fulling mills through the country, even to some 
extent in the more southerly settlements. The net result was 
similar for large sections of the country, —a dominant family 
manufacture. Moreover, the elapse of decades produced little 
change in the typical situation. Indeed, a close survey of the de- 
velopment in the colonies reveals no marked alteration in condi- 
tions within this manufacture between the earlier and the later 
periods of colonial history. We can proceed at once, therefore, to a 
description of the methods and types of colonial production as they 
obtained in the latter years of the colonial era, — the era for which 
more adequate information is available. We may well fix upon the 
years around 1760 as the date for analysis, since the typical colonial 
development was by that time as fully advanced as at a later date, 
and was as yet undisturbed by influences such as came with the 
popular opposition to the British tax measures, and with the 
excitement precursory to the Revolutionary War. 

1 Bishop, History of American Manufactures, i, 301. (Hereafter referred to as 
Bishop.) 

2 Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, p. 177. (Hereafter 
referred to as Weeden.) 

8 Johnson, Wonder Working Providence of Zion’s Savior in New England, 
Pp. 130. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 5 


1. Wool Supply. 


Sheep were not known to the native American Indians, and the 
wool used by the English and other colonists came from animals of 
imported stock. Just what was the breed of these first animals is 
not definitely known;‘ but whatever their original type, they in- 
evitably deteriorated under the harsh natural conditions and the 
general neglect of those early days. Usually unprovided with ade- 
quate shelter from the rigors of the New England winter, and 
allowed to breed promiscuously, the sheep yielded a wool which 
eventually lost all pretense to fineness; nor could improvement 
- through imported stock be secured, for in 1660 the British Parlia- 
ment forbade the exportation of sheep from England. Down to the 
time of the Revolution the domestic wool was evidently of in- 
different grade, being characterized as ‘“‘of good strength, in the 
quality neither fine nor coarse.’’? Comments of contemporaries, 
in fact, seem rather to stress the poor quality of the colonial fleeces. 
“The wool of our northern plantations,” wrote the Englishman, 
Douglass, in 1755, “‘is of as good a staple (length), but coarser than 
the English wool; and further south in our colonies, the wool be- 
comes coarser . . . aS in our sugar islands; therefore the planta- 
tions are not capable of rivalling England in fine woollens.” % 
Phineas Bond, writing after the Constitution had been adopted, 
expressed somewhat similar sentiments. ‘The propagation of 
sheep” had not been attended with much success, he said, “‘the 
climate not being propitious.” ‘‘What little wool is raised,” he 
added, “‘is of a very ordinary quality and can only be applied to 
the coarser manufactures.” * Even Hamilton was in doubt as to 
the future of the domestic wool culture. While hoping that the 
development of the woolen manufacture would stimulate better- 


1 Wright, Wool Growing and the Tariff (p. 2), whom I follow quite generally in 
regard to the wool supply for the industry in every period. (Hereafter referred to 
as Wright.) The English unimproved sheep seems to have been the one most 
generally brought over, though the Texel breed probably came to the New Nether- 
lands from the mother country. 

2 Wright, p. 11. 

3 British Settlements, ii, 265. Cf. Burnaby, Travels through North America, 
p. 137. 

4 American Historical Association Reports, 1896, 1, 632. 


6 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


ment in the flocks of the country, he could see no clear prospect of 
such advance: “It is yet a problem,” he says, “‘whether our wool 
be capable of such a degree of improvement as to render it fit 
for the finer fabrics.”?! However, when the conditions of manu- 
facture in the colonial industry are taken into account, the reasons 
for this backwardness. are apparent. The time was not yet ripe 
for attention to be drawn to the circumstances of wool produc- 
tion. 

Yet, in the meantime, a status of domestic wool-growing such 
as that just pictured and the practical absence of the importation 
of wool in the colonial period * inevitably placed an important 
physical limitation upon the character of the wool manufacture. 
At best, cloths of none but medium to coarse quality could be 
produced. Yet, as has been said above, the lack of an adequate 
market restrained improvement of the country’s flocks. A 
vicious circle existed, escape from which was some decades in 
coming. 

As to the quantity of wool, there is conflicting evidence. An 
Englishman, writing in 1765, made the pessimistic estimate that 
‘fall the wool in America is not sufficient to make Stockens for 
the Inhabitants;’’ and somewhat later, similar sentiments, per- 
haps derived indirectly from this man Colden, were expressed by 
Phineas Bond and by Lord Sheffield.* Yet there are no com- 


1 Hamilton’s “Report on Manufactures,” in Taussig, State Papers on the Tariff, 
p.o9. The eighteenth-century production of wool in England, to be sure, con- 
tained no wool comparable with the present-day merino; but if the views of 
contemporaries are to be accepted, an appreciable, if not a marked, difference 
in quality existed between the British and the colonial clips. 

2 Winthrop in his Journal (p. 323) speaks of the importation of wool in 1643; 
but the export of wool, as well as of sheep, from England was prohibited after 1660 
by the British government. 

8 Colden is quoted in Beer, p. 79. For Bond, see American Historical Associ- 
ation Reports, 1896, p. 632, where he doubts if the quantity of wool raised in the 
country prior to the Revolution was enough to have “supplied the inhabitants of 
the country with their winter stockings.”’ Lord Sheffield (Observations, 1784, p. 25) 
makes the assertion a bit stronger. Quoting a Mr. Otis, he asserted that there was 
“not enough wool raised in all America to make each person in it one pair of stock- 
ings.” The similarity of these various expressions, especially the use of stockings 


as a standard of measurement, makes one suspicious as to the independence of the ~ 


three estimates. 


a a a 


ES ee ae 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION i, 


plaints in colonial documents of a shortage in supply, at least 
after the early years of settlement; and the meagerness of im- 
portations during this period seems to argue to the same effect. 
I am inclined to the latter view. It seems very doubtful if the 
colonial manufacture was restricted in scope by reason of defi- 
cient raw material supply. Where the number of sheep exist- 
ing at the time is known to have been small as in the southern 
colonies, other influences controlled the situation, dictating not 
only the meager sheep husbandry but also the procurement of 
wool-cloth supplies in large measure otherwise than through 
domestic production. 


2. Technical Equipment. 


The mechanical equipment upon which the colonial wool- 
workers had to rely for aid in the manufacture of wool cloths 
naturally reflected the situation in the wool-manufacturing tech- 
nique of the mother country. No Industrial Revolution had yet 
wrought havoc with the old, simple methods of production in 
England, — though by 1760 this Revolution was beginning to 
exert its powerful influence. The colonial settlers had brought 
over with them the implements then used in many parts of Eng- 
land in the household production of wool fabrics, or at best those 
employed by-the handicraftsmen in the more extensive wool- 
working regions of Yorkshire or the West of England. With the 
exception of the more elaborate fulling mill, these comprised 
merely a few hand tools. The processes and the technical equip- 
ment used in them require examination. 

After the wool had been tub-washed and thereby scoured of 
its dirt and wool-grease as thoroughly as the limited chemistry of 
the times permitted, it was prepared for the spinning wheel upon 
hand cards, or, if worsted yarn were desired, upon hand combs. 
Supplies of both these instruments were imported largely from 
England throughout the colonial period, although toward the 
end they began to be manufactured here. Hand cards consisted 
of small rectangular pieces of leather, backed with board and 
provided with a handle, through which at regular intervals wires 
with slightly bent ends had been stuck. The process of carding 


8 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


itself, as with the present carding machines, had for its purpose 
the straightening and intermixing of the wool fibers. A small 
quantity of the scoured wool was combed and rubbed between 
the hand cards until the individual fibers had been laid somewhat 
parallel and fibers of the various lengths mixed in fairly uniform 
manner. Such straightening and intermixture promised to give 
the tensile strength and the homogeneity necessary to the spin- 
ning of satisfactory yarn. When the intermixture was deemed 
by the carder to be sufficient, the movement of one of the hand 
cards was reversed and the wool cleared from the wires of both 
cards, condensed in the shape of a loose roll ready for elongation 
and twisting in the spinning operation.’ 

Hand combs, though also hand tools for working the loose 
wool, differed materially in construction from these hand cards. 
They were of somewhat similar form, but were made more 
largely of metal, were stouter, and were equipped with such 
heavy and well-tapered wire that the protruding points — fewer 
in number — resembled spikes rather than pins. The aim and 
method of use likewise differed. Not only was greater emphasis 
placed upon the parallelization of the longer fibers, but now the 
shorter fibers must be removed from the wool and the two prod- 
ucts, long and short pieces, separately delivered. To accom- 
plish these ends, one of a pair of combs was secured upon a hook 
on the wall or held high with one hand; a small quantity of wool 
was thrust well into its teeth; and the other comb was drawn 
through this mass of fibers with a repeated downward motion, 
the whole batch from time to time being replaced on the upper 
comb and reworked. Finally there remained in the teeth of the 
upper comb only the longer, paralleled fibers — the “top” — 
which were carefully removed in a loose form ready for the 


1 Bramwell gives this description of hand-carding: “A card... was more like 
a large brush, and this brush was composed of fine wire bristles, which leaned at 
a given angle instead of being straight. Two such brushes or cards were used 
together by the operator, having one in each hand; tufts of wool were placed on 
them, and by repeatedly stroking one brush against the other, the tufts of wool 
were straightened and lay amongst the wire bristles, which then required only to 
be taken carefully away from the card without disturbing the smoothness of the 
wool.”” Bramwell, The Wool-Carders’ Vade Mecum, 1881, p. 130. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 9 


spinner; while in the teeth of the working comb clung only the 
shorter staples — the ‘‘noil’’ — which could then be discarded.! 
Proper manipulation of hand combs required greater strength 
and skill than that of hand cards. Accordingly, while hand- 
carding was usually cared for by the women and older children 
of the family, hand-combing was primarily the province of adult 
male workers, and, by reason of the skill involved, usually of 
specialized workers. | 

The spinning of wool was generally done upon the hand spin- 
ning wheel, though the older distaff and spindle were not un- 
known to the earliest colonists. This operation fell commonly to 
the charge of the women and older girls of the family, and, 
though tedious, was a relatively simple affair with relatively 
simple equipment. The old spinning wheel, still frequently to be 
seen among relics of the colonial period, consisted essentially of 
but a spindle, similar to the one which had been used in the earlier 
distaff and spindle process, made to revolve more evenly and 
rapidly by means of the cord or band passing around it and over 
a large wheel that could be turned by hand. The “carding”’ or 
“‘top,” according to whether woolen or worsted yarn was being 
spun, was held in the spinner’s left hand and attached to the 
spindle. By an outward movement of this hand, the slubbing 
or unformed yarn was elongated to the desired extent. At the 
same time a stroke of the spinner’s other hand set the big wheel 
in motion and thus caused the spindle to revolve at a more or less 
rapid rate, as deemed necessary; and by this means the binding 
twist was put into the yarn. Subsequently, by a change in posi- 
tion of the spinner’s left hand, the completed product could be 
wound upon the spindle.” | 

For weaving, not only was the equipment somewhat more com- 
plex, but the strength and skill necessary for its operation were 


1 The terms “top” and “‘noil” have been retained in the modern worsted termi- 
nology, being applied to the corresponding semi-manufactured products of the 
machine industry. The shorter fibers, or noils, could always be used in the manu- 
facture of woolen yarns. 

2 The wheel with the foot-pedal for driving the spindle, though employed in 
flax spinning, was not used for spinning wool, presumably because of the greater 
need of a delicate touch in working the latter. 


Io THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


greater. The loom was a relatively large and heavy apparatus, 
something of a fixture in the shed or outhouse; and, with the 
beams, heddles, batten, and shuttle, it was a rather complicated 
device. Moreover, the colonial looms were usually quite crude 
affairs, being built frequently by the local carpenter, if they were 
not indeed the product of the home workbench. Some improve- 
ment in the character of the loom, to be sure, seems to have been 
made during the colonial period, but there was no change in its 
essential parts. Even the fly shuttle, invented by John Kay of 
Bury, England, in 1733, was not employed to any considerable 
extent in this country until after the Revolutionary War.' It is 
narrated, moreover, that even as late as 1793 a manufactory of 
this device, begun in Philadelphia, was short-lived for want of 
encouragement and support, and moved to Nova Scotia.” The 
operation of the early machine or implement, however, called for 
so much energy and skill that usually the labor of men was re- 
quired. Frequently, too, the situation gave rise to a body of male 
workers who devoted themselves wholly or chiefly to this task. 
These men worked at the homes of the customers or in their own 
shops, weaving up the homespun yarn into cloths of the cus- 
tomers’ specifications. Weaving was, accordingly, less exclu- 
sively a household operation than were the preceding stages in 
manufacture. 

Woolen cloth produced under such conditions, even though 
woven by handicraft workers, must have been rather an uneven 
and surely a rather unsightly fabric. For firmness of texture and 
for good appearance, much would depend upon the finishing 
operations. Fortunately for the colonial household industry, and 
apparently as a result of these very conditions of household pro- 
duction, the essential process of fulling had early come into the 
hands of men who gave their time and efforts chiefly, if not solely, 
to this operation.? Mention has already been made of the estab- 
lishment of a fulling mill in Rowley, Massachusetts, in 1643. 

1 Clark, History of Manufactures in the United States, 1607-1860, p. 160. (Here- 
after referred to as Clark.) 

2 Bishop, i, 333- 

3 Sometimes flour-milling or other power work was combined with cloth fulling 
in the water-driven mill. 


ee ee eS ee 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 102 


Contesting it in priority was one in Salem.! Following these, 
mills were erected at Roxbury in 1657, Dorchester in 1659, and 
Watertown in 1662.” The erection of mills in the New England 
colonies thereafter becomes too rapid and widespread to follow 
closely.* In other colonies, the introduction was seemingly not 
so early, although information concerning this development 
is not complete. For example, the first mention of one in Vir- 
ginia relates to 1692, and the first Pennsylvania mill was set 
up in Darby about 1698. As to total numbers erected in the 
colonies as a whole, no good estimate is possible. Statistics 
for a few sections of the country, however, are suggestive. In 
Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, twelve were reported 
in 1760,* while Worcester County, Massachusetts, had between 
thirty and forty in 1793, and Middlesex County, twenty-four in 
E7002 

The fulling of cloth prior to the introduction or without the 
employment of the fulling mill was accomplished in a peculiarly 
inefhcient, almost indifferent manner. The most usual among 
such methods was to soak the fabric thoroughly in warm soap- 
suds and then beat it with sticks upon a flat surface such as a 
wooden floor. Another method, in the nature of a pastime 
similar to a corn-husking bee, was for the family and its guests to 
draw their chairs into a circle on the kitchen floor about which 
the soapy cloths were kicked around and around by the bare feet 
of the company.® Seemingly no considerable attention under 


1 Weeden, p. 177. 2 [bid., pp. 200, 203. 

3 A partial list for New England is as follows: 
1662 and 1686 Watertown. 1687 Newbury, Mass. 
1673 Andover. 1689 the Ballards, Mass. 
1675 Ipswich. 1693 New London, Conn. 
1676 Salem. 1700 Stamford, Conn. 
1681 Dedham. 1706 Colchester, Mass. 
1682 North Andover. 1707 Guilford, Conn. 
1686 East Hartford, Conn. 1709 Dorchester, Mass. 


1687 Barnstable, Mass. 
Weeden, pp. 203, 306, 394; and Bagnall, History of the Textile Industries, pp. 237, 
310. 
4 Bishop, i, 377. 5 Bishop, i, 420. 
6 S. N. D. North, ‘‘The New England Wool Manufacture,” in Davis, New Eng- 
land States, i, 191-192. 


12 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


either of these methods was given to the evenness or exact degree 
in which the fulling or shrinkage took place. 

The mechanical fulling carried on in the fulling mills, however, 
could devote care to the proper treatment of the fabrics. The 
principles of this machine fulling followed closely those of the 
hand or household process. The cloth was kept thoroughly wet 
with soapy water and was subjected to pressure or repeated beat- 
ings. The fulling stocks where the operation really occurred con- 
sisted of a large wooden box standing on end and with one side 
partly open. In the upper part of the space within the box were 
two rollers, and at the bottom was a trough filled with the soapy 
water. The piece of cloth, tied end to end, was passed between 
the rollers and was drawn up from the water as, driven by the 
water-wheel of the mill, these rollers revolved. Originally only 
the pressure of the rollers seems to have supplied the force given 
by the sticks or feet in the household process; but later wooden 
hammers were added, these and the rollers now being both actu- 
ated by water power. The rollers, raising the cloth regularly 
from the trough, squeezed the larger part of the water from the 
fabric, and by pressure brought about a closer consolidation of 
the constituent fibers and yarns; and the hammer-strokes falling 
upon the cloth yet damp aided in the intimate intermeshing of 
these component parts. ‘The fuller’s contribution lay in the 
knowledge, gained from experience, of the mixture of soap and 
water — later of fullers’ earth as well — that should most ad- 
vantageously be employed, and of the proper speed and duration 
of the shrinking operation. He could see to it that the cloth 
fulled evenly, and as thoroughly as possible without affecting the 
strength of the fabric. Unquestionably better cloths were se- 
cured through the services of a well-conducted fulling mill.! 

With this highly important operation of fulling, the proprietor 
of the fulling mill usually combined other finishing operations,— 

1 Another method of fulling is described in Smith, History of Berkshire County, 
i, 471. It was a sort of rubbing process: “the cloth was placed in a long wooden 
box, a stream of suds was poured in, and the pieces of cloth were pushed forward 
and back under heavy blocks, which were grooved and made to move alternately 


over the cloth.” ‘This is, as far as I know, a unique method. It had no counter- 
part in more recent technology. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 13 


shearing and sometimes dyeing. Such additional treatment was 
not considered necessary for all cloths, nor was the practice of 
various consumers the same for similar fabrics. Frequently, 
moreover, the dyeing was carried out in the households, espe- 
cially if the cloth were dyed “‘in the wool.”’! Proper dyeing, how- 
ever, is a process calling for considerable knowledge of the dyeing 
materials and methods and for considerable skill in the handling 
of the fabrics while in the tub or vat; and both these aptitudes 
were to be gained in colonial times only as the fruit of long prac- 
tice. Consequently, all the finer goods were dyed by the fuller, 
and this operation, as well as that of fulling itself, became largely 
separated from the household. Again, shearing was a difficult 
affair. The purpose of this process was to clip evenly the ends 
of wool fibers which projected from the woven woolen fabric.” In 
the case of face fabrics, such as broadcloths, a much greater num- 
ber of evenly clipped fiber ends were required than were thrown 
up by the earlier processes. Shearing was then preceded by a 
process called napping. Hand cards similar to those used .in 
carding proper were drawn repeatedly over the surface of the 
cloth, fiber ends being scratched up from the body of the fabric. 
Shearing itself was accomplished by means of hand shears, — 
merely large scissors. The cloth was laid out upon a flat table 
and the shears passed over the surface of the fabric in such a 
manner that a constant space was maintained between the cut- 
ting edge of the shears and the body of the cloth. Obviously this 
operation demanded peculiar skill. Therefore, it was a process 
rarely, if ever, found in the household. 


3. Industrial Organization. 
In the foregoing description of manufacturing processes, the 
features of industrial organization under colonial conditions have 


1 That is, if the wools which went into the making of the fabric were dyed while 
still in the form of loose fleece. Dyestuffs were peddled about the countryside for 
use in the household dyeing tubs. 

2 Worsted fabrics did not require shearing. The greater care with which the 
wool fibers were laid parallel in the preparatory process resulted in a much smoother 
yarn, and so in a cloth of which the surface was relatively free from protruding 
fiber ends. To secure an even clearer face, worsted cloths might, and in modern 
manufacturing practice universally are, also sheared. 


14 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


in a measure been anticipated. For the woolen-cloth production, 
the primary factor was the household. Here the wool was 
scoured, carded, spun, frequently woven, and occasionally fulled. 
As might be expected, the processes which were customarily con- 
fined to members of the household alone were those for which 
the strength and skill of the women and older children were ade- 
quate. Where masculine strength or special dexterity was de- 
manded, the process gravitated to some degree into the hands of 
special groups of workers. Sufficient consideration has already 
been given the most numerous and most important variety of 
specialized workers, the fuller and cloth finisher. Beyond these, 
the only important group of such workmen connected with 
woolen-cloth production was that of the weavers. ‘Then, the 
other, the worsted-cloth branch of the industry, supported the 
special worsted workers, while in addition there were minor 
types, some but indirectly connected with the wool manufacture 
proper, such as the card-makers and comb-makers. - 

Men who carried on the trade of weaving as a distinct vocation 
were among the early arrivals in the colonies. Guest states that 
great numbers of woolen and worsted weavers, who had widely 
adopted Puritanism, were driven from England by the persecu- 
tions of Laud and his followers, and that some of these went to 
Massachusetts Bay. Other waves of immigration brought repre- 
sentatives of this handicraft, men who had learned the trade in 
Yorkshire or Suffolk and who continued to follow it in their new 
homes. William Rix, ‘“‘a weaver,” is mentioned in Boston rec- 
ords as early as 1640.” Johnson, writing in 1652, mentions 
weavers aS one group of noteworthy handicraft workers.* In 
Windsor, Connecticut, an inventory of 1669 showed ‘‘yarne at 
the weaver’s”’ and in Virginia, a year earlier, one William Parker 
is mentioned as owning and operating a loom in York County, 
recelving much encouragement from the county for his quasi- 
public service.* With the spread of settlement the weaver became 


1 Cotton Manufacture, p. 41. 

2 Weeden, p. 213. 

3 Wonder Working Providence, p. 209. 

4 Weeden, p. 305; Bruce, Economic History of Virginia, ii, 470. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 15 


a necessary member of every community. Sometimes, moreover, 
the business of weaving reached no mean proportions. In 1684 
a man at New London, Connecticut, possessed four looms 
-and tackling, besides a silk loom; !a Virginia weaver bought 
a hundred-acre plantation in 1686;2 and in 1741 Widow 
Bayley advertised in the Pennsylvania Gazette to sell six 
looms, twisting and warping mills, and several servant weavers.® 
Inasmuch, too, as apprenticeship was frequently followed in 
this trade, it is apparent that here again, as in the character 
of implements employed in wool-working, a bit of old York- 
shire had been transplanted practically unmodified to the new 
country. 

These handicraft weavers may further be divided into two 
general groups. One sort, probably confined to the more popu- 
lous settlements, maintained a central shop to which his cus- 
tomers brought their yarn to be woven. Widow Bayley’s late 
husband was evidently of this type. Such too would be the case 
when, as occasionally happened, a fuller set up a weave-shop in 
conjunction with his .mill.4 The other type was the itinerant 
weaver. The prosperous farmer who desired a somewhat better 
grade of fabric than he or members of his family could produce, 
or families which had no weavers in the household, employed this 
sort of workman, who traveled the countryside weaving up the 
season’s cloth requirements for his patrons. These latter workers, 
though infrequently mentioned in colonial records, must have 
played an increasingly important réle in the wool manufacture of 
the times. In certain areas they surely were essential. Thus, in 
New York, the practice of the later colonial period, it seems, was 
customarily to requisition the services of such workmen. Gov- 

1 Weeden, p. 305. 

2 Bruce, Economic History of Virginia, ii, 470. 

3 Clark, p. 163, note. 

4 William Simmons of Williamsburg, Virginia, a fuller, advertised in 1774: “I 
advise the Publick, that I have two Looms at Work that weave five Quarter Yard 
wide Cloth . . . My price for Weaving is one shilling a Yard, Fulling, Dying, Dress- 
ing, etc. one shilling more, for common Cloth, but dearer for live Colours. Those 
persons that dye their Cloth in Grain have it done much cheaper; all mixed Cloths 


require Nothing more than Fulling and Dressing, which are done at a moderate 
Price”? (Documentary History of American Industrial Society, ii, 326). 


16 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


ernor Moore, writing to the Lords of Trade in 1767 and describing 
the household system as he saw it on his “‘last Tour,’’ — where 
‘“‘every house swarms with children, who are set to work as soon 
as they are able to Spin and Card,” — added the following: “As 
every family is furnished with a Loom, the Itinerant Weavers who 
travel about the Country, put the finishing hand to the Work.” ! 
To be sure, these two general types of handicraftsmen 
merely represent broad classifications. Occasionally a given 
workman would seem to straddle the two classes, as when a 
weaver with a town shop went on a country tour during a 
dull season, or perhaps customarily in the summer months. 
Such was evidently the case of the Rhode Island workman, 
spoken of by North, whose operations took him “out among 
the larger farmers working his trade of weaving, while his wife 
carried on the business of weaving at home, having a number of 
apprentices.” ” 

In the southern colonies, the form of household production for 
woolen goods was subject to minor variations, — in so far as wool 
fabrics were produced at all in the South, — due to the presence 
of indentured servants and slaves and to the existence of the 
plantation system. Colonial records in their references to in- 
dentured servants who had run away give suggestions as to the 
number of such people engaged in the cloth manufacture. 
Weavers are often mentioned, — though of course some allow- 
ance must be made for other textile productions, — and some- 
times a fuller or “clothier” is sought among the fugitives.? 
There are evidences also of the occasional use of slaves for spin- 
ning or weaving. The plantation system, moreover, encouraged 
the establishment of workshops for cloth production with perhaps 
two or three workers, though seemingly goods for slaves’ gar- 
ments were about all that was attempted. The account books 


1 Documentary History of New York, i, 734. 

2 North, ‘‘The New England Wool Manufacture,” published in installments in 
the Bulletin of the National Association of Wool Manufacturers, 1899-1900; 1809, 
p. 125. (Hereafter referred to as North, Bulletin.) 

3 A representative case is that of a fugitive who was a “‘fuller by trade and will 
brag largely of his knowledge in dyeing cloths of two colors, one side scarlet, the 
other blue” (New Jersey Archives, Newspaper Extracts, v, 552). 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 1, 


for a year or two with respect to a typical workshop of this sort, 
that of George Washington, are extant, showing that consider- 
able manufacture on behalf of his family was carried through.! 
Even as plantation agriculture was carried on somewhat differ- 
ently from the manner of northern subsistence farming, so the 
household system of cloth manufacture was subject to modifi- 
cation in the same environment, — without, however, losing its 
essential character.” 

In the worsted trade, the other chief province of the handi- 
craftsman, two types of organization can also be distinguished. 
In one form, the work had a wholly or almost wholly professional 
character. Both wool combing and worsted weaving were skilled 
operations, and apparently not to be undertaken by the unprac- 
ticed household workers. Weeden states that he found no 
mention of worsted combs in either traders’ or household inven- 
tories;* and, considering the minor character of this manufacture, 
the references to worsted weavers are frequent. Sometimes these 
two operations of combing and weaving were carried on by one 
man or under his supervision. The case of John Cornish of 
Boston may be quoted. When Cornish died in 1695, the ap- 
praisal of his estate contained entries of ‘‘woosted,” ‘white 
yarne,” two pair of combs, four looms and tackling, and two dye 
furnaces.* In these cases, however, the yarn spinning was not 
always confined to the shop of the worsted worker. Seemingly, 
a part of his requirements was usually cared for in his own house- 
hold, but some of the spinning might be put out on commission. 
One John Wareing of Salem was loaned money by the town in 
1685 “‘to pay spinners;”’*® and worsted-spinning rates are quoted 

1 These accounts are reprinted in part in Documentary History of American In- 
dustrial Society, pp. 319-325. They cover the years 1767 and 1768. That the 
operations of this shop were wholly for the family or plantation’s consumption may 
be gathered from the heading of the second year’s accounts: ‘‘Spun and Wove in 
the year 1768 for my own use.” 

2 It may be borne in mind that, as intimated above, the household manufacture 
of woolen cloth was substantially less widespread in the southern than in the north- 
ern colonies: see below, pp. 24-26. 

3 Weeden, p. 392. 


§ Tbid., p. 389. He also operated a fulling mill. 
5 Abbott, Women in Industry, p. 23. 


18 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


for Pennsylvania as early as 1698.1 However, it may be noted 
that household work of this latter sort was merely supplementary 
to the handicraftsman’s labors — quite different from the situ- 
ation in the woolen-cloth production. 

The other form of worsted manufacture approached more 
closely that of the primarily household woolen industry. Here 
the direction of the work was in the hands of the household, and 
some of the actual manipulation was done by its members. For 
preparation of the “‘top,”’ assistance was indeed needed of handi- 
craftsmen, itinerary wool-combers, combing at the home of their 
patrons. Evidence of this practice is sufficient, though not over- 
abundant. Worsted yarn appears occasionally in the inventories 
of colonial estates; * while a specially clear case pertains to the 
Hazards of Rhode Island: In 1778 Thomas Hazard in his account 
book credited one Valentine Ridge with certain sums:* 


By combing at my house 40 lbs. of wool 
By combing at thy house 3334 lbs. of wool. 


Seemingly the combed wool in such cases was thereafter spun by 
the women in the household; and, finally, an itinerant weaver 
would work the yarn into calimancoes, tammies, or other worsted 
cloths upon his employer’s loom, or at his own shop.* Such an 
organization of production, however, undoubtedly was much less 


1 Thomas, History of Pennsylvania, 1698, p. 36. Thomas’s reference to women’s 
work in this connection is too entertaining to be omitted. He has been speaking of 
the exorbitant rates of women’s wages, due to the fact that women “are not very 
numerous.” “They have for Spinning either Worsted or Linen, Two Shillings a 
Pound, and commonly for Knitting a very Course pair of Yarn Stockings, they 
have half a Crown a Pair; moreover they are usually Marry’d before they are 
Twenty-Years of Age, and when once in that Noose, are for the most part a little 
uneasie, and make their Husbands so too, till they procure them a Maid Servant to 
bear the burden of the Work, as also in some measure to wait on them too.” 

For other worsted spinning rates, see Abbott, Women in Industry, p. 23; Clark, 
Pp. 157- 

2 Weeden, pp. 306, 392. 

3 Hazard, College Tom, p.95. However, this phenomenon may have been pecu- 
liar to the Revolutionary period. 

4 As early as 1657, a worsted weaver of Boston devised two looms in his will 
(Weeden, p. 391). Thomas in his History of West New Jersey, 1698, speaks of 
worsted weavers (p. 17) and Clark gives weaving rates for worsted weaving (p. 157). 
See also Hazard, College Tom, pp. 97-103. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 19 


common than that in which everything was left to expert arti- 
sans. I am inclined to believe it distinctly rare throughout the 
colonial period. 

In sum, then, there was already a difference of industrial form 
in the two branches of the wool manufacture, woolen and 
worsted-cloth production. In so far as the worsted-cloth manu- 
facture was prosecuted — and we shall find subsequently that it 
was quantitatively much inferior to woolen-cloth production — 
it was more particularly a handicraft affair. Chiefly a town 
industry, it was dominated by specialized workers. The woolen- 
cloth manufacture, on the other hand, was primarily a house- 
hold function. To be sure, at no time except perhaps at the very 
commencement of a new settlement was there a pure and un- 
qualified household system of production of wool cloths in this 
country. The professional weaver and the fulling mill appeared 
early, — whenever a settlement had passed the pioneer stage,— 
and by 1760 production with such assistance was apparently the 
commonest form. Still the household system of this modified 
type was the dominant method. In this branch of the industry, 
there was no manufacture on a distinctly handicraft system. 
Moreover, it may be noted that throughout the colonial period 
forms of production other than household and handicraft were 
practically unknown. References to a real “‘putting-out”’ system 
of production are so scant as to mark them as distinct excep- 
tions;? and not until the disturbances following the Stamp Act 

1 T have found for the woolen manufacture in the pre-Revolutionary period only 
two references to a system more advanced than the handicraft. Bagnall in his Tex- 
tile Industries of the United States (hereafter referred to as Bagnall) says of Thomas 
Hazard of South Kingstown, Rhode Island, that ‘‘there are indications that he em- 
ployed handloom weavers as early as 1750 in weaving cloths, linen, woolen, and 
mixed, for sale in his store” (p. 283). And Clark makes the general statement that 
“old account books show that merchants gave out flax, cotton, and wool to the 
country people to spin and weave for them” (p. 163). As will appear later, when 
the matter of trade in domestic wool fabrics is discussed, the presumption is against 
any extended development of such systems of production. I am inclined to think 
that as far as wool manufacture is concerned, production for merchants was for their 
own needs, details of which not improbably became mixed with the ordinary store 
accounts. 


At the time of the Revolutionary War, woolen spinners working, it seems, upon 
order became important, at least in certain communities. For example, the towns 


20 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


and accompanying the Revolutionary War did establishments 
arise that even ventured to call themselves factories. For this 
woolen branch, then, — which was in fact so predominantly im- 
portant as really to give character to the whole wool manufac- 
ture, — the period until 1760 was unquestionably the era of 
household production. 


4. Extent and Quality of Colonial Production. 


An exact measurement of the quantity of wool fabrics produced 
in the colonies at any one time, even in a single colony, is of course 
impossible from a lack.of statistical data; but one may hope to 
determine roughly the proportion for the country as a whole, 
which domestic production, based primarily upon the household 
system, bore to the total consumption; whether this proportion 
was the same among various sections of the population; whether 
there was any change in this proportion between the earlier and 
the later colonial periods; and, finally, what types and qualities 
of fabric were generally manufactured. In arriving at conclu- 
sions upon these points, one must tread warily among the 
opinions of hostile governors, of colonists who feared to awake 
opposition of the English government or of English merchants, 
and of observers who in speaking had in mind only a section 
of the country.! 


of East Greenwich, Connecticut, and of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, during the war 
fixed the price or wage for such work, in the latter case with the specific entries, 
‘Spinning, Woolen warp, taking it home” and “spinning by the week from home” 
(Weeden, p. 790; Allen, History of Chelmsford, pp. 173-174). These rates appar- 
ently referred to the labor of women, the rate of ‘spinning by the week”’ coming next 
to and being at about the same figure as “‘ Housework by the week.” It may be 
added that the mention of “‘ woolen warp”’ suggests the employment of such workers 
upon the manufacture of warp yarns alone. Warp yarns receive greater strain in 
the process of weaving, and hence must be somewhat better spun than filling yarns. 
Yet whatever the frequency with which this phenomenon occurred in the Revolu- 
tionary period and whatever the scope of the work, I am inclined to think the oc- 
currence a result of the peculiar conditions of the war years, especially the increased 
dependence upon household production. 

1 Nearly any view of the extent of colonial manufacture can be argued from in- 
dividual statements of contemporaries. Occasionally conflicting estimates for the 
same sections of the country and within a few years of one another in time may be 
found. Even reports of the Board of Trade, when not prejudiced, were likely to be 


ee 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 21 


The household production of wool cloth will be the starting 
point in this discussion; and here we may at once take cogni- 
zance of certain factors which throughout a long period of our 
history markedly affected such production. Chief among these 
factors were the transportation facilities and the style element. 
Whenever means of transportation were introduced more effec- 
tive than those which had before existed, domestic or foreign 
goods produced by more advanced methods penetrated areas 
which had earlier been dominated by the household manufacture. 
Better qualities of fabrics were brought into more immediate com- 
petition with the household output. Indirectly, too, improved 
transportation facilities had an important effect. They created 
or improved the markets for the local products, and thereby in- 
creased the purchasing power of the newer communities over 
alien (non-local) woolen goods. For the colonial period itself, — 
there was at times or in given areas sheer lack of local produce 
marketable in the cloth-making region, the mother country, by 
reason chiefly of the high transportation costs. Lacking com- - 
modities of relatively high value and small bulk, certain colonies 
were constrained to go more fully into the manufacture of their 
own clothing than perhaps otherwise would have been the case, — 
and under the circumstances of the times such manufacture 
would take place chiefly in the colonial household. Secondly, 
wherever the element of fashion developed force, the products of 
the household loom, at best rough in character, could not with- 
stand the competition of the better made foreign goods, —or, 
with regard to later periods, the competition of all factory-made 
goods. And this element of fashion, it may be noted, made ap- 
pearance whenever any considerable town communities arose. 
Such successful competition on the part of alien goods was the 
result in some degree of superior organization of labor, of greater 
specialization among the workers in wool, and to a large measure 
of superior machinery. 
inaccurate. That such was the case appears from the testimony of Colonel Dunbar, 
Surveyor-General of his Majesty’s Woods, who informed the Board that “it was 
with the greatest difficulty that they (the officers of the Government) were able to 


procure true information of the trade and manufactures of New England”’ (Bishop, 
i, 341-342). 


22 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


The conditions of wool-cloth production in the colonies fore- 
shadow these general features that were to characterize the house- 
hold production throughout its existence in the United States. 
For example, the area of predominant household manufacture — 
the area where all or practically all the clothing worn by the 
people was wrought up in the home — was chiefly the regions 
where either the difficulties of transportation had play or style 
did not count. The report to the Board of Trade compiled in 
1723 stated: ‘‘Those Settlements which are distant from Water 
Carriage, and are remotely situated in the Woods, have no op- 
portunities of a Market for Grain, and therefore as they do not 
raise more Corn than is sufficient for their own Use, they have 
more time to manufacture both Wooll and Flax for the Service of 
their families, and seem to be under a greater necessity of doing 
it.’ ? Or again, in a more specific case: Governor Hunter of New 
York, in answer to inquiries in 1715 as to the extent of the use of 
homespun, wrote back to England that the people of New York 
and Albany wore no clothing of their own manufacture, but if 
their Lordships referred to the planters and poorer sorts of coun- 
try people, the computation (previously sent) had understated 
rather than exaggerated the situation, although he thought 
that no homespun was sold in shops.? The lack of a “ Market for 
Grain” and for other products of a semi-pioneer community was, 
I believe, the more important factor. The superior English fab- 
rics would have been used if they could have been purchased, and 
they were worn where the proceeds of the “‘three-cornered trade”’ 
or other commercial transactions gave purchasing power, or 
where there were readily marketable products.® 


1 Representation, p. 20. 2 Lord, Industrial Experiments, p. 133. 

% See below as to southern conditions, pp. 24-26. 

The Representation above quoted went on to say with regard to the northern 
colonies: ‘‘We did not find that these People had the same Temptation to go on with 
those Manufactures (flax and woolen) during the time that the Bounty upon Naval 
Stores subsisted — for the height of Wages, and the great Price of Labour in gen- 
eral throughout America, make it impracticable for the People there to manufacture 
Linen Cloth for less than twenty per cent more than it would cost in England, or 
Woollen Cloth for less than fifty per cent above the Price of that which is exported 
from hence for Sale” (Representation, p. 20). Valueless as these ratios are, the 
idea behind them is not without merit. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 23 


Again, with the growth of the seaport towns, there developed 
a greater solicitude for fashionable dress than was possible in the 
earlier days. Such goods came in part from the domestic worsted- 
cloth makers who carried on their handicraft in these towns, but 
in larger part fabrics of suitable quality, especially the fancier 
woolens such as broadcloths, had to come from abroad. A differ- 
entiation between “city and country people”’ was noted in 1758 
by Acrelius in writing of New Sweden. The former “procure” 
their articles of dress “‘from the merchants’ shops,” while the 
latter ‘‘make them for themselves, and usually of coarser stuff.” ? 
The town gentleman in all the colonies probably secured the 
greater part of his fabrics “‘from the merchants’ shops,” that is, 
he bought imported goods; though in most of the larger centers 
he soon had the alternative of the worsted-cloth makers who set 
up their manufacture there. And these gentlemen seem to have 
displayed a marked prejudice against cloths of family industry. 
Even in financial straits or despite popular pressure they stuck 
to their finer fabrics. For instance, in the exciting days of the 
decade preceding the Revolutionary War, when at times English 
goods were proscribed by voluntary agreements, the town folk 
were the people hardest to get into line as far as clothes were con- 
cerned. 

One may go further, I believe, and draw some distinctions as 
to the prevalence of household production in the different sec- 
tions of the country, — at least between the northern and south- 
ern colonies. In the former, for instance, the town population 
by the later days of the colonial period had come to form a some- 
what greater proportion — though still really a low proportion — 
of the total population than was true in the southern area. Ship- 
building, foreign trade, and even minor manufacturing had 
created a town-dwelling populace, whereas in the colonies lower 
down the coast the towns were more largely mere transshipment 
points for the produce of the interior. In so far the northerly 
plantations would probably be found a less considerable produc- 
ing region for household fabrics. 


1 Acrelius, “History of New Sweden,” in Pennsylvania Historical Society 
Memoirs, xi, 157. 


24 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


On the other hand, the people living outside these larger cen- 
ters in the northern colonies, the great majority of the popula- 
tion, utilized their own household productions, it seems, more 
largely than in the South. Indeed, such people appear to have 
used their home-made goods almost exclusively. John Bridger, 
Collector of Customs for New England, reported in 1715 that 
‘‘country people and planters have entered so far into making 
their own woolens that not one in forty but wears his own card- 
ing, spinning, etc.” Governor Moore of New York wrote in 
1767: ‘“‘The Custom of making (these) Coarse Cloths in private 
families prevails throughout the entire province, and almost in 
every House a sufficient quantity is manufactured for the use of 
the family,” but, he added, “‘without the least design of sending 
any of it to market.’’? Mitchell, in his account of the colonies, 
published in the same year, estimated of the northern area that 
‘two-thirds or three-fourths of the people are clothed with manu- 
factures of their own making.” * Such seems to be the consensus 
of opinion among contemporary observers, although, to be sure, 
there is an occasional discordant voice, the reason or motive for 
which is not now discernible.* 

In the more southerly colonies, however, the situation appar- 
ently was somewhat different. There the production of articles 
such as tobacco and rice, which found a ready sale in English or 
other foreign markets, gave the inhabitants a greater purchasing 
power over English wool fabrics. For instance, with regard to 
Maryland, the earliest seat of the tobacco culture, it was said in 
1721: ‘‘The Inhabitants wear the like Cloathing, and have the 
same furniture within their houses with those in this Kingdom 
(England). The slaves are cloathed in Cottons, Kerseys, flannel, 


1 Lord, Industrial Experiments in British Colonies, p. 131. 

2 Documentary History of New York, i, 734. 

3 Mitchell, Present State of Great Britain and her Colonies, 1767, p. 300, note. 

4 For example, Jonathan Belcher, Governor of Massachusetts, reported in 1731 
that ‘‘the Country People who used formerly to make most of their Clothing of their 
own Wooll, do not at present manufacture a Third Part of what is necessary for 
their own Use, but are generally clothed with English Manufactures;” or Colden’s 
oft-repeated remark made in 1765, that ‘‘all the wool in America is not sufficient to 
make Stockens for the Inhabitants” Representation of 1733, p. 12; and Beer, 
Commercial Policy, p. 79). 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 25 


and coarse linens all imported.” ? Colonel Johnson, Governor of 
South Carolina, reported a decade later that the manufactures 
established there which interfered with those of Great Britain 
were ‘‘scarce worth naming,” including, as far as woolens were 
concerned, only ‘‘ coarse mixed Cloths made of Cotton and Wooll, 
for the use of their Negroes;”’? and for Virginia substantially the 
same story was told.*? Unquestionably there were regions, such 
as considerable parts of North Carolina, where household pro- 
duction of wool or cotton and wool fabrics was rather extensively 
carried on; and on some of the plantations small shops for manu- 
facture with the aid of indentured servants or slaves were estab- 
lished; but the proportion of domestic production to total con- 
sumption of wool fabrics was apparently much less than in the 
colonies north of Maryland, even after allowance for the smaller 
town population. 

The conclusion, then, seems warranted: that only economic 
pressure induced the colonists to carry on household manufac- 
tures of wool, the better cloths of foreign origin normally being 
preferred. And testimony of both northern and southern com- 
mentators gives strength to this view. Lord Cornbury, Governor 
of New York,— surely one not inclined to make excuses for the 
colonists,— stated in 1705 that “‘the want of wherewithall to 


1 New York Colonial Documents, v, 606. Beverley in his History and Present 
State of Virginia, London, 1705, makes a more amusing comment on this situation: 
The Virginians, he said, “have their clothing of all sorts from England, as linen, 
woollen, and silk, hats and leather. The very furs that their hats are made of per- 
haps go first from thence. Nay, they are such abominable ill-husbands, that though 
their country be overrun with wood, yet they have all their wooden ware from Eng- 
land; their cabinets, chairs, tables, stools, chests, boxes, cart-wheels, and all other 
things, even so much as their bowls and birchen brooms, to the eternal reproach of 
their laziness’”’ (quoted in Beer, Commercial Policy, p. 70). 

2 Representation of 1733, p. 15. | 

3 [bid., p. 14: “Some poor People provided themselves with Clothing of a Kind 
of coarse mixed Cloth made of Wooll and Cotton, and of Linsey-Woolsey, where 
they were unable to purchase better by their Labour in the Cultivation of To- 
bacco.” 

The Commissioners for Trade and Plantations in reporting the fact that in 
America “the People have fallen into the Manufacture of Woollen and Linen Cloth 
for the Use of their own families,” restricted the area so affected to New England, 
New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and the County of Somerset in Maryland, 
i. e., to exclude the southern colonies generally. 


26 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


make returns for England, sets mens witts to work,”’ leading them 
to the greater production of domestic goods.' Governor Seymour 
of Maryland in 1708 spoke of “‘pinching want”’ putting some men 
upon family manufacture; and Governor Spotwood of Virginia in 
1711 laid the resort to manufacture to ‘‘necessity and not incli- 
nation.’’? Such conditions, in the light of the general economic 
situation in northern and southern communities, made for differentia- 
tion between the two. At the same time, they presaged a tena- 
cious hold on the domestic manufacture in some parts of the country, 
at least until commerce and industry were more fully developed. 

In neither the northern nor the southern colonies, however, 
was the extent of domestic production a fixed and constant affair, 
though the fluctuations were more frequent and more consider- 
able in the South. Minor fluctuations were attributable to ir- 
regularities in the less well-organized commerce of the period,— 
failure of anticipated shipments from England, and the like. To 
these were added the greater ones caused by failure of cloth sup- 
plies during war time or by disaster to an export crop. It will be 
recalled, too, that war existed during more than a third of the 
time between 1696 and 1765. In 1695, for example, Governor 
Nicholson of Virginia wrote to the Lords of Trade: “‘If ships do 
not come from England to fetch the tobacco and bring good quan- 
tity of linen, woolen, working-tools and other necessaries, it will 
put the people upon clothing themselves.” * Again a “great 
scarcity and dearness of (woolen) goods” was reported in 1706, 
during which such fabrics sold at 200 per cent advance. And this 
scarcity, it was said, forced the people to set up ‘‘a very consider- 
able manufactury . . . for Stuffs, Kerseys, Linsey Woolseys, 
Flannels, Buttons, etc.’’* Failure of the regular convoy in 1707 
caused scarcity of clothing and other goods in Maryland;* in 


1 Documentary History of New York,i, 711. Part of this message to the Board of 
Trade was the well-known sentiment: ‘‘I hope I may be pardoned if I declare my 
opinion to be that all these Colloneys are but twigs belonging to the main tree 
(England),” etc. 

2 Dickerson, American Colonial Government, p. 305. 

3 Calendar of British State Papers, Colonial, xiv, 509. 

4 Smith, Memoirs of Wool, ii, 158. 

5 Dickerson, American Colonial Government, p. 305. 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 27 


1711 an overproduction of tobacco in Virginia, and in 1743 an 
overstock of rice in South Carolina made difficulties.1 It is doubt- 
ful, however, if such events influenced materially the situation In 
the colonies. After the several colonies had been founded a few 
years, the land tested out, and the course of commerce well laid, 
there was apparently little change prior to 1760 in the degree to 
which domestic goods were produced and worn. With the in- 
crease in size of the seaports, there was some extension of the mar- 
ket for the finer, imported fabrics, but the rate of such growth was 
of course very gradual. Even long after national independence 
had been secured, we were preponderantly an agricultural people, 
and until internal commerce was well developed, the farms con- 
tinued the source of considerable household wool-cloth production. 

The range in types among woolen goods produced in the 
colonies was not great. Chief among such products was that 
called ‘‘homespun.”’ This was an all-wool fabric, well fulled, 
worn without artificial coloring or piece-dyed, and more rarely 
dyed in the wool, but ever distinctly rough in character. As the 
name implies, this was strictly a household product. A some- 
what similar cloth was “‘linsey-woolsey,”’ differing particularly in 
that the warp or longitudinal threads were spun of flax. It was 
an extraordinarily durable fabric, lasting for years. Probably, 
too, somewhat greater pains were taken in its manufacture. On 
account of one or both of these factors, linsey-woolsey was gener- 
ally valued at about twice homespun. These two fabrics far ex- 
ceeded all others in importance. For example, none others are 
mentioned by Governor Moore in his description of the wool 
manufacture in New York in 1767: ‘‘There is a general manu- 


1 Virginia Historical Society, Collections, i, 72-74; Macpherson, Aunals of Com- 
merce, ill, 260. 

Another colonial phenomenon, seemingly connected with the periods of cloth 
shortage, is that of the “spinning craze,” as the contemporaries denominated it. 
The first “‘craze”’ of any note occurred in 1721. At the fourth anniversary of the 
Boston Society for Promoting Industry and Frugality, three hundred “young 
female spinsters” worked at their wheels on Boston Common, where weavers with 
their looms also attended. A few years later, 1753-1754, there was another “‘spin- 
ning craze,’”’ during which Charlestown, Massachusetts, voted to turn its old town- 
house into a spinning school. (Weeden, p. 680; Tryon, Household Manufactures, 
p. 86.) 


28 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


factory of woolen carried on here, and consists of two sorts, the 
first a coarse cloth entirely woolen three quarters of a yard wide; 
and another stuff which they call linsey-woolsey.”* In the 
South, a cloth made of cotton and wool mixed, which apparently 
had no specific name, was of some importance. It was used by 
the poorer sorts of people, and was given to the slaves. Outside 
of these goods, others are but infrequently mentioned; kersey and 
flannel are the only ones worth noting. The production of such 
a luxurious fabric as broadcloth was rarely attempted. I have 
found no mention of its manufacture prior to 1760. About. that 
time, however, one Martin Read, a weaver located in Rhode 
Island, was weaving up broadcloth for people of his clientéle. 
For example, records show that in 1766 he wove for one customer 
fifty-seven yards of this fabric at a price of £34. 48.2 Presumably 
other professional weavers were turning out similar goods from 
time to time. But the time was not ripe for any large domestic 
production of so fine a fabric: in 1767 some Yorkshire weavers 
who had recently come from England in the hopes of setting up 
such a manufacture in America soon found the conditions un- 
favorable.* For many years no considerable amount of broad- 
cloth was produced in this country. 


1 Documentary History of New York, i, 734. 

2 North, Bulletin, 1899, p. 125; quoting from Mrs. Earle’s Narragansett Days. 

3 “Report of Gov. Moore to the Board of Trade,” January, 1767; quoted in 
Bishop, i, 371. 

The adventures of the Yorkshire weavers may have had connection with the 
scheme for wool manufacturing reported in the Connecticut Courant for October 20, 
1764. This report outlines the most ambitious project for the production of wool 
cloth that I have found in colonial material. Though its ultimate fate is uncertain, 
the announcement in the Courant is exceedingly interesting: 

‘Dispatch from Boston, October 8. There seems to be a disposition in many of 
the inhabitants of this and the neighboring governments to cloath themselves with 
their own manufacture. — At Hampstead, on Long Island, in the Province of 
N. York, a company of gentlemen have set up a new woollen manufactory, and 
having given notice to gentlemen shopkeepers and others, of any of the provinces, 
that by sending proper patterns of any colour, they may be supplied with broad- 
cloths, equal in fineness, colour, and goodness, and cheaper than any imported, the 
proprietors give good encouragement to any persons who are any way vested in the 
woollen manufactory, such as wool combers, weavers, clothiers, shearers, dyers, 
spinners, carders, or understand any branch of the broad-cloth, blanket, or stroud 
manufactory.” 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION 29 


One feature about the colonial woolen-cloth manufacture de- 
serves special notice, the utilization of cotton and linen in con- 
junction with the wool fiber. This was, as far as I can ascertain, 
a new departure. Neither in England nor on the Continent was 
there such a fabric as linsey-woolsey, nor was there an inter- 
mixture of the wool and cotton fibers for the formation of a yarn.! 
Apparently these American practices were the result of the pecu- 
har colonial environment: the need of a stout fabric, and at 
least for some parts of the country the need of one with a lower 
heat resistance than all-wool cloth; the growth of wool and flax 
or wool and cotton in close proximity to one another; and the 
freedom from guild regulations or the habituations of long-con- 
tinued commerce. Left to itself and given a variety of raw ma- 
terials, the American wool manufacture developed cloths which 
satisfied the particular needs of the community. 

Carried on in a more highly organized system, the colonial 
worsted manufacture correspondingly yielded a greater diversity 
of products. Moreover, inasmuch as the trade was in the hands 
of professionals to a considerable degree, men who frequently had 
practiced the manufacture in the mother country, the cloths not 
uncommonly were copies of English goods. Among these may 
be mentioned serge, calimanco, druggets, crapes, camblets,— 
perhaps all to be included under the general term of stuff-goods. 
The only worsted fabric which appears to have been of American 
origin is that called “‘tammies,”’ a light cloth used for dresses. 
Little is known of this fabric, especially as to how it differed from 
the other worsted cloths. These others, including serge, were 
somewhat of the character of the present English “‘stuffs,’’ the 
dress-goods and linings made so extensively in the Bradford 
(England) district. Like the latter, they were rather stiff and 
glossy, but they were probably heavier than the modern stuffs. 


1 This type of mixed yarn has until recently been called merino. Despite the 
fact that this appellation was common in the trade, the Federal Trade Com- 
mission has latterly (1922) ruled that “merino” is a term of deception, mis- 
leading prospective purchasers of goods so named into believing the fabric is 
made of wool from the merino sheep. Accordingly practice in the trade is now 
upset. However, since no new description of this type of mixed yarn can be 
said to have become general, I shall use the old term throughout this study. 


30 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


Finally, we should note that the worsted fabrics made in this 
country during the colonial era seemingly approached more 
closely than the woolen ones the standard of English cloths. 
Lord Cornbury stated as early as 1705: ‘‘I myself have seen 
Serge made upon Long Island that any man may wear” ! — 
probably a substantial exaggeration, but suggesting that this 
coarse worsted cloth was produced not without skill. 

In general it may be said that the domestic wool manufacture 
was primarily by and for the household. It was carried on chiefly 
in the home and turned out fabrics which, while perhaps not 
stylish, were distinctly serviceable, as homely things should be; 
and the manufacture was sufficiently extensive through the 
northern colonies to cover the requirements of the larger pro- 
portion of the population, the people who lived outside the larger 
towns. The southern communities were less dependent upon the 
domestic production, but they possessed some household activity, 
especially among the back settlements and the “poorer sort of 
housekeepers.”’? As yet the domestic market was too restricted 
and uncertain to encourage the development of manufacture upon 
a more elaborate basis than the part-household and part-handi- 
craft system of the colonial era. 


5. Colonial Trade in Wool Manufactures. 


The extent to which domestic manufactures of wool entered 
into colonial and into intercolonial commerce is on the face of the 
evidence a rather uncertain matter. On the one hand, there are 
data of individual cases where homespun or other wool products 
were sold or traded within or between colonies; and on the 
other, emphatic statements from contemporaries that such events 
never occurred. 

On the first side of the question may be instanced the report — 
of Armstrong, Collector of Customs for New England, in 1720, 
that the wool manufacture had been “brought to such perfection 
that thousands of pounds’ worth of stuffs and druggets (worsted 


1 Documentary History of New York, i, 711. 
2 Governor Spotwood of Virginia in Virginia Historical Society Collections, 
172: 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION - 31 


fabrics) were sold in Boston shops.’’! Or one may note the ‘ad- 
vertisement of a fair at Burlington, New Jersey (1764), inviting 
the colonists to bring ‘‘all kinds of linen and woolen manufactures 
of this and neighboring colonies”’ for sale.2 Again, the report of 
the Council for Trade and Plantations to the Queen in 1702 made 
mention of the fact that the northern colonies ‘‘do not only 
cloath themselves with woollen goods, but furnish the same com- 
modity to the more Southern Plantations, notwithstanding the 
prohibition”’ in the Woolens Act of 1699.3 In1756 it was recorded 
that a shipment of two hundred homespun jackets was made from 
Boston to Albany;* and Germantown worsteds and stockings 
formed part of the merchandise sent southward from Philadelphia, 
an early distributing center.® But perhaps the most suggestive 
fact is the duty of ten per cent ad valorem imposed in 1699 by 
New York upon “all woolen manufactures made in our neighbor- 


1 Quoted from Board of Trade papers in Lord, Industrial Experiments, p. 136. 
Weeden mentions that in 1747-1748 “ white and striped”? homespun appear in mer- 
chants’ stocks in Boston (p. 679). Cf. also Mitchell, Present State of Great Britain 
and her Colonies, 1767, p. 300, note. 

Note might also be made of the entries in an old account book of a Boston store- 
keeper (now in the Boston Public Library) covering the years 1685-1689, which 
credited several persons with cloth, almost all worsted, that had evidently been 
accepted in lieu of cash. (This account book is quoted in Abbott, Women in Indus- 
try, p. 24.) The number of entries is not over a dozen in the four years, and the 
greatest quantity credited to a single individual was sixty-two yards, all serge. See 
also Bagnall, Textile Industries of the United States, p. 283, referring to Thomas 
Hazard’s putting-out of weaving (see above, p. 19, note 1), which may be an occur- 
rence of the same sort as the above. There is further evidence of prices of co- 
lonial wool manufactures (e. g., cf. Clark, p. 140), but the great majority of such 
quotations are from probate records. 

2 New Jersey Archives, Newspaper Extracts, v, 439. Cf. also Bishop, 
Petre. 

3 Calendar of British State Papers, Colonial, xx, 695. The Woolens Act is de- 
scribed below (see pp. 40-44). In brief it prohibited all export and intercolonial 
trade in wool and wool products. This account goes on to state: ‘‘We have been 
particularly informed by persons employed by us to make enquiries, that as good 
' druggets are made in those countries as any in England, and sold there for 4s. and 
4s. 6d. per yard.” 

4 Weeden, p. 679. 

5 Clark, p. 117; quoting Weeden, ii, 590, and others. In Maryland Historical 
Society, Publications (No. 4, p. 56), it is stated that goods sent from Fredericktown 
toGeorgia included fine woolen goods, though these were imported in all prob- 
ability. 


32 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


ing colonies which shall be imported into the Province and De- 
pendency.”’ ? 

Contrariwise, Governor Hunter of New York stated in 1715 
that it did not consist with his knowledge that ‘‘ever any home- 
spun was sold in the shops.” ? Governor Tryon of North Caro- 
lina similarly asserted: ‘I have not heard of a piece of woolen 
or linnen cloth being ever sold that was the manufacture of this 
province.” * Finally, among other similar statements may be 
noted the most astonishing one, made by the Commissioners of 
Trade and Plantations who in 1702 had reported the shipment to 
the southern plantations of cloth made in New England and other 
northern colonies: they assert in 1728, with reference to all the 
provinces north of Maryland, “‘We could not learn that (the 
people) have ever manufactured any (Woollen or Linen Cloth) 
for Sale in any of the Colonies, except in a small Indian Town in 
Pennsylvania, where some Palatines have of late years settled.’’ 4 

An appreciation of the character and circumstances of the do- 
mestic wool-manufacturing industry enables one to make a 
partial resolution of these apparent contradictions. The earlier 
report of the Commissioners reporting intercolonial traffic in 
woolens coincided with Queen Anne’s War, and may well have 
been a temporary phenomenon.’® Again, worsteds, the product of 
the specialized handicraftsmen, are the goods that, quite dispro- 
portionate to the relative size of worsted-cloth production in the 
colonies, are more particularly mentioned in the provincial com- 
merce. Nor is there anything surprising in the possibility that 
storekeepers accepted worsted cloth in exchange for other com- 


1 New York Colonial Laws, i, 404. 

However, this phrase in the law regulating customs was dropped two years later 
when an act otherwise substantially the same was passed. Possibly a tax on woolen 
goods from the “‘neighboring colonies” was not worth the trouble of collection. 

2 Documentary History of New York, i, 714. Cf. also p. 722. 

3 Colonial Records of North Carolina, vii, 429. 

4 Representation of 1733, p. 19. 

5 It may be noted that the date of Armstrong’s allegation concerning the “ thou- 
sands of pounds’ worth of stuffs and druggets”’ (1720) is also the date of a temporary 
shortage of supplies in Maryland (Lord, Industrial Experiments, p. 137), and just 
precedes the first “spinning craze” in Boston, 1721 (Tryon, Household Manufac- 
tures, p. 86). 


THE DOMESTIC PRODUCTION | 33 


modities, or that an occasional bale of worsted manufactures was 
shipped southward. When these two groups of cases have been 
eliminated, the number of instances that probably occurred where 
real homespun woolens were “sold in the shops” or at fairs, 
become so few that they may well be put down as mere exceptions 
to the general statement that such fabrics were not produced for 
sale. Goods might be exchanged locally between households 
_ when one was made up of more men than women — and so had 
a deficiency of output — and another was composed chiefly of 
women, thereby having a surplus capacity of manufacture. 
But in view of the quality of the household productions,! and of 
the availability of worsteds and imported woolens in the seaport 
towns and in the larger sections of the southern plantations, a 
considerable trade in the predominant household manufactures 
would appear most unlikely. It seems to me more probable that 
local or intercolonial commerce in such goods was a negligible 
feature of the colonial period. 

1 Mitchell says: “Two-thirds or three-quarters of the people are clothed with 
manufactures of their own making. . . . They make them for their own use, and as 
these are so much better than what are made for sale, it is an inducement for every 


one almost to make them” (Present State of Great Britain and her Colonies, 1767, 
Pp. 300, note). 


CHAPTER II 
GOVERNMENTAL POLICY 


INTRODUCTION 


THE period during which the wool manufacture was begun in the 
colonies was one in which governmental interference in industry, 
and governmental encouragement and control of industry, 
were commonly believed to be beneficial and even necessary. 
Accordingly, one is not surprised to find both colonial and Brit- 
ish legislatures attempting to stimulate or check the develop- 
ment of the wool-cloth manufacture as their interests dictated, 
or at least as they thought their interests dictated. To 
trace the course of these governmental policies and to assess 
the real effects thereof upon the industry are the purposes of 
this chapter. 


1. Colonial Encouragement. 


The difficulties in inaugurating the wool manufacture, and the 
irregularities of cloth supplies, were the forces which led localities 
and colonies from time to time to grant various inducements for 
the benefit of the industry, or to institute various regulations 
for the control of the trade. Two broad types of action may 
here be distinguished, — the more specific sort in which the 
end sought was the inauguration of a particular development or 
change, and the broader type when by bounties or general 
regulations improvement in the welfare of the whole industry 
was desired. 

The more specific type of encouragement was offered in the 
form of grants of land or of special privilege contingent upon or 
in return for certain services to be rendered the wool manufacture. 
Such enactments were confined largely to the period before 1700, 
to the period of beginnings within the industry. For example, 
the town of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, in 1656 secured its first 


34 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY | 26 


professional weaver by admitting him as an inhabitant and allot- 
ting him thirty acres of land ‘“‘provided he set up his trade of 
weaving and perform the town’s work.”’! The General Court of 
Connecticut in 1686 granted Francis Thrasher and his servant 
“freedom from training and work at highways” so long as they 
carried on their trade of making cloth and serge.?, Massachusetts 
allotted as much as three hundred acres of land to William Hub- 
blefield of Boston “in consideration of his good services in pro- 
moting and instructing many persons in the trade and mystery 
of cloth-making.”* Then, of somewhat wider scope were enact- 
ments like that of Virginia in 1693 which gave to fullers who 
owned land on one side of a stream, the right to have an acre on 
the other side condemned for the convenience of carrying on the 
work of their mills;* and that of Rhode Island as late as 1751, 
which exempted “‘clothiers, fullers, weavers, and artificers”’ from 
taxes and public service for seven years.® 

The more general sort of provincial aid dated from the period 
1640-1650. In Massachusetts a bounty measure was voted by 
the General Court in 1640: 3d. in a shilling were to be given dur- 
ing a period of three years for every yard of linen, woolen, or 
cotton cloth, provided, in the case of the two former, they 
were spun and woven of ‘‘wool or linen grown here.” This 
was but temporary, being repealed in seven months as “‘too 
burthensome to the country.” ® Other acts followed: one for- 
bidding the export and attempting to check the slaughter of 
sheep, as the colony was ‘‘in great straits in respect to cloth- 
ing” (1654),’ and a broader act two years later which aimed 
to compel greater household manufacture, as well as to make 
conditions more favorable for the pasturing and improvement 


1 Bishop, i, 312. 

2 Connecticut Public Records, iii, 196; quoted in Clark, p. 46. 

3’ Massachusetts Archives, lix, 234-236; quoted in Clark, p. 4o. 

4 Bruce, Economic History of Virginia, li, 464. 

5 Rhode Island, Acts and Resolves, April, 1751, 80-81; quoted in Clark, 
p. 46. 

6 Weeden, p. 170. 

7 Wright, p. 3; quoting from the Records of the Massachusetts Bay Company, iii, 


355-356. 


36 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


of sheep. Subsequently, in 1675, the exportation of wool was 
forbidden.? 

Other colonies found it necessary or thought it advantageous 
to enact similar statutes. Maryland granted a bounty of ten 
pounds of tobacco for every yard of woolen cloth produced in the 
colony; * and in 1663 forbade the export of wool.* Rhode Island 
as late as 1751 granted a bounty on cloth manufactured of wool, 
equal to one-third the appraised value thereof.° But most 
elaborate of all was the series of enactments passed by Virginia 
extending from 1656 to 1705, and covering prohibitions of exporta- 
tions for both sheep and wool, bounties on cloth manufactured, 
and the compulsory erection and maintenance of a weaving shop 
in each county.® 


1 The General Court urged the selectmen of every town to encourage women, 
boys, and girls in spinning and weaving; every family was to be assessed for one or 
more spinners, or for a fractional part, and that “every one thus assessed do after 
this present year 1656 spin for thirty weeks every yeare, a pound per week, of lining, 
cotton, or woolen and so proportionably for halfe or quarter spinners under the 
penalty of 12d. for every pound Short;”’ and for the increase of raw material, the 
commons were to be devoted to sheep, rams were to be inspected, and hemp and 
flax seed saved and sown (Weeden, p. 198. For text, cf. Bishop, i, 311-312). 
Weeden says this law had little effect beyond to make spinners at home (p. 304); 
but how considerable was this increase is unknown. It probably was not large, 
since the law could not have been strictly enforced. 

2 Bishop, i, 311. 

3 Maryland Archives, ‘“‘Proceedings of Assembly,” vii, 325; quoted in Clark, 
D. 34. 

4 Calendar of British State Papers, Colonial, v, 163. 

5 Rhode Island, Public Records, v, 318; quoted in Clark, p. 35. This law was re- 
pealed in three months’ time since “it may draw the displeasure of Great Britain 
upon us, as it will interfere with their most favorite manufactury ” (p. 319). 

6 The series of laws are of sufficient moment to be briefly listed: 

1656 Northampton County, across the Bay, was given authority to promote 
and govern its own manufactures, among which the woolen industry was 
of some importance (Wise, Early History of the Eastern Shore of Virginia, 
p. 303). 

1657 Export of sheep prohibited (Bishop, i, 321). 

1659 Export of wool prohibited (Bruce, Economic History of Virginia, ii, 461). 

1662 Bounties of five pounds of tobacco for every yard of woolen cloth made in 
the Province, as well as a lesser one for linen cloth and for the prepara- 
tion of flax and hemp; of ten pounds for every good hat made of wool or 
fur, and for every dozen pair of woolen or worsted stockings (Bishop, 


i, 320). 


des 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY | 37 


Obviously there was no regularity of form and no continuity 
of policy with respect to special encouragement of the wool manu- 
facture. Nor in the diverse and varying conditions of the several 
colonies could one expect uniformity or continuity. Again, the 
encouragements extended apparently had little or no influence 
upon the industry’s development, except perhaps in a very local 
or temporary way. Stronger forces than bounties or restrictions 
upon trade held the manufacture in its grip, and really directed 
the course of its growth. However, these cases of direct public 
aid given to the wool manufacture do have a particular signifi- 
cance to one who is surveying the whole development of the in- 
dustry, by reason of their relation to subsequent national policy. 
Public encouragement to the wool-manufacturing industry is not 
a product of the nineteenth century. It dates back almost to the 
first attempt at such manufacture in this country; and, as will 
appear later, the line of descent from these early grants of land 
or of exemption from taxation is direct to the more recent grants 
of special protection. 


1666 The General Assembly ordered the court of each county to set up a loom 
and employ a weaver at it, under penalty of 2,000 pounds of tobacco 
(Bruce, ii, 461). Repealed in 1684 (Bishop, i, 321). 

1668 Children of indigent parents were to be instructed to spin and weave, 
among other trades (Bruce, ii, 461). 

1671 Prohibition on the exportation of wool repealed; but it was re-enacted in 
1682 (Bruce, ii, 462). 

1682 At the instance of Lord Culpeper, the bounty law was revived: six pounds 
of tobacco was to be paid for every yard of woolen, linsey-woolsey, or 
linen cloth, which must be made from materials grown by the person who 
manufactured it. Also bounties were given on fur or woolen hats (ten 
pounds each), and for each dozen pair of worsted hose for men and women 
(twelve pounds). Bruce thinks the results of this act were good, as in the 
year there were presented to the county court of Middlesex productions 
of 14, 34, 45, 55, 61, and even 95 yards of woolen cloth by different men. 
Records of other counties are lost (Bruce, ii, 463). In 1684, this measure 
was repealed, because it was too heavy a burden on the public, and there 
was no longer need of encouragement. 

1686 This law was revived, and was continued until 1694 (Bruce, 
li, 464). 

1693 A bonus of two acres of land, as already noted, was granted to each fulling 
mill erected (Bruce, ii, 464). 

1705 In the famous Act of Ports, a duty of 6d. a pound was placed upon the 
export of wool (Bruce, ii, 561). 


38 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


2. British Interference. 


The policy of the British government toward the wool manu- 
facture in the colonies had its origin, as has already been inti- 
mated, in the Mercantilist thought of the seventeenth century. 
Among the various phases of this thought was a well-elaborated 
colonial policy which conceived of the mother country and her 
offspring as being mutually dependent, — rather more than in 
Lord Cornbury’s concept that “‘all Colloneys . . . are but twigs 
of the main tree,”’ for the homeland was to be the complement of 
the plantations. The mother country was to work up the raw 
materials supplied by the colonies, and the colonies to consume 
the manufactures produced by the mother country. With this 
theory of colonial position and responsibilities in mind, the peo- 
ple and government of England would be bound to view with 
apprehension the possibility of a competitive woolen industry 

arising in their American possessions. 

' As it happened, the wool manufacture was, in fact, the first 
among various colonial attempts at industrial activity to attract 
the attention of the home authorities — at least, it was the first 
manufacture to be restricted.1 Why the modest colonial wool 
manufacture that I have sketched above should have raised ap- 
prehension in England, may well seem puzzling, — especially at 
the early date when regulatory action was in fact taken, at the 
close of the seventeenth century. Several reasons or possible ex- 
planations may be suggested. Unquestionably there had been a 
development of household woolen production in many of the 
colonies, assisted by the operations of handicraft weavers and by 
the employment of fulling mills. This provincial manufacture, 
regarded by the colonists as a mere necessity under the economic 
conditions, might well be considered by Englishmen to work a 
diminution of the market for English fabrics. In point of fact, 
the colonial market for such goods may not have expanded dur- 
ing the preceding half-century or so, proportionately with the 


‘1 The hat manufacture was not prohibited until 1733, and iron-working was not 
restricted until 1750; and it should be noted that these with the wool manufacture 
were the only ones attacked by British legislation. 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY 39 


increase in settlement. We do not know whether or not this in 
truth was so. Furthermore, exaggerated accounts of the colonial 
manufacture had apparently reached England. Macpherson re- 
ports that complaints were made of the exportation of wool and 
wool manufactures from ‘‘our North-American plantations . . . 
to foreign markets formerly supplied by England.” ! The facts 
were that a negligible shipment of wool from the hard-pressed 
northern colonies did occur — Nantucket is the only place specifi- 
cally mentioned ? — but I have found no evidence at all implying 
an exportation of wool manufactures. Yet not only the more 
widespread woolen industry, but the frail and hesitant worsted 
production was a source of perturbation to Englishmen.? Then, 
the fancied threat of the colonial wool-manufacturing industry 
made a greater impression upon those interested in the English 
manufacture because English exports of wool fabrics had during 
the seventeenth century been suffering increasingly severe com- 
petition from the expanding continental industries, and in the 
latter part of the period from the manufactures exported out of 
Ireland.* Such a situation as this easily stirred the British gov- 
ernment to action, since of all the English industries the wool 
manufacture was the ‘“‘most favorite.” ® Indeed, during the 
period of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, wool-manu- 
facturing was in England popularly considered the backbone of 
the country’s strength, the source of her greatness. Hence any 
threat or possible misfortune to that enterprise was to be warded 
off by the most effective measures available. Thus, then, the 


1 Macpherson, Annals of Commerce, ii, 705. 

2 Douglass, British Settlements, 1755, ii, 182, note: ‘Some years since .. . some 
(wool) was shipped from Nantucket to France, very small quantities.” 

8 James in his History of the (English) Worsted Manufacture says of this period: 
“From the jealousy . . . exhibited of the worsted manufacturers of our Plantations, 
it is evident that the weavers who in the time of Charles I were forced from their 
homes to find refuge in New England, and other parts of America, had prospered, 
and so far advanced in their occupations as by just retribution to be competitors 
with us in the markets of the Continent” (p. 177). 

4 James, op. cit., pp. 175-176. 

5 See above, p. 36, note 5. 

The wool-sack of the House of Lords typifies the elevated esteem in which this 
manufacture was then held. 


40 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


prevailing colonial theory, seconded by material and nationalistic 
interest in the most precious British industry, called for leg- 
islation which would curb the advancing colonial interest in 
wool. 

The first step in this direction came in 1683 when the British 
Commissioners of the Customs disallowed the two laws passed 
by Virginia in the preceding year, which prohibited the exporta- 
tion of wool from the colony and granted bounties upon the 
manufacture of woolen and linen cloth and some other woolen 
products.! The disapproval or veto of these laws was based on 
the ground that they conflicted with the spirit of the Navigation 
Laws.?. The Virginia government, however, paid little attention 
to this decision, continuing to carry out her laws, and to give 
bounties for ten years longer. 

Then, at the close of the century, came the second step in the 
development of the government’s policy. Without preliminary 
investigation and apparently without serious consideration, as 
far as the colonies are concerned, Parliament passed the so-called 
Woolens Act of 1699, which proposed a new departure in the 
mother country’s attitude toward the provincial wool manufac- 
ture. Passage of the act was made possible, it seems, merely by 
the circumstance that in the main the law conformed with the 
prevalent opinion as to the proper function and position of a 
colony, that the precious wool manufacture of the country was 
somehow concerned, and that a convenient opportunity arose 
for enacting this piece of legislation. Consideration apparently 
was not given to the facts: that, on the one hand, a portion of the 
act was actually prejudicial to England’s real interest with re- 
spect to the colonies; while, on the other hand, the law was 
chiefly unnecessary and could not but be irritating to the over- 
sea subjects of the Crown. 

The text of the act is seemingly of sweeping character, and by 

1 See above, p. 36, note 6. 

2 The relation of these Virginian laws to the Navigation Laws was discussed in 
full in the veto, and ranged from the contention that they lessened the dependence 
of the colonial population upon England to that, that they advanced the cost of 


tobacco to the English consumer by raising the charges of navigation — seemingly, 
through the diminution of the return cargo (Bruce, ii, 464). 


a 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY 41 


reason of the law’s importance it will be given in full, in so far as 
it relates to the colonies: ! 


XIX. And for the more effectual Encouragement of the Woollen Manu- 
factures of this Kingdom, be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid, 
That from and after the first Day of December in the Year of Our Lord 
One Thousand Six Hundred and Ninety-Nine, no Wooll, Woollfells, Short- 
lings, Mortlings, Wooll-flocks, Worsted, Bay, or Woollen Yarn, Cloth, 
Serge, Bays, Kerseys, Says, Frizes, Druggets, Cloth-Serges, Shalloons, or 
any other Drapery Stuffs or Woollen Manufactures whatsoever, made or 
mixed with Wooll or Wooll-flocks, being of the Product or Manufacture of 
any of the English Plantations in America, shall be loaden or laid on board in 
any Ship or Vessel, in any Place or Parts within any of the said English 
Plantations, upon any Pretense whatsoever; as likewise, that no such Wooll, 
Woollfells, (or other goods afore-mentioned) . . . shall be loaden upon any 
Horse, Cart, or other Carriage, to the Intent and Purpose to be exported, 
transported, carried or conveyed out of the said English Plantations to any 
other of the said Plantations, or to any other Place whatsoever; . . . and 
all Governors or Commanders in Chief of the said respective Plantations, as 
also all Officers employed in the Customs, or other Branches of his Majesty’s 
Revenue there, are hereby authorized, charged, and required to take effec- 
tual Care, that the true Intent and Meaning of this Act, so far forth as it 
relates to the said respective Plantations, be duly put in Execution. 


Curiously enough, there has been some dispute as to the “‘true 
Intent and Meaning”’ of this legislation. Weeden seems to have 
been responsible for the original misunderstanding. He misread 
the law as prohibiting not merely export or intercolonial trade 
but even trade within a given colony, or, as he puts it, as “‘for- 
bidding the transport of wool or woolens, by horse or cart, away 
from the New England husbandman’s door.’’? Other writers 
apparently have followed his interpretation. However, a care- 
ful reading of the paragraph quoted above would show the exces- 
sive breadth that he gave to the law. Anexamination of the 
conditions under which the legislation was passed, and of the 
interpretation given it by contemporaries, sweeps away all sup- 
port to the foregoing view. 

The paragraph already given was attached at the end of a law 
relating to the Irish wool manufacture, the intent of which was 

1 ro and 11 William III, ch. to, art. xix. 

2 Weeden, i, 388, 393. 

3 Rabbeno, American Commercial Policy, p. 19; Bancroft, History of the United 


States, iii, 106; Beer, Commercial Policy of England toward the American Colonies, 
p. 77; Busching, England und seinen Kolonien, p. 32. 


42 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


explicitly to check the competition of Irish woolens with the Eng- 
lish upon the continental markets. There is no trace of a purpose 
to prevent Irish production for Irish needs. Even the enforce- 
ment machinery set up by these leading sections of the act, in- 
cluding patrolling squadrons off the Irish coast, indicates that 
exportation from that island, not local manufacture, was the 
action at which objection was leveled. As for the portion of the 
act pertaining to the colonies, the similarity of phraseology in 
this portion would itself suggest a probable similarity of inter- 
pretation. So, too, would the manner with which application of 
restrictions, — aimed in the first instance at a far different situa- 
tion in Ireland, — was made to colonial activity. The represen- 
tation of the Commissioners for Trade and Plantations to the 
House of Commons, recommending the bill, gives the impression 
that application of similar legislation to the colonies was an after- 
thought. This recommendation reads that, since the northern 
colonies, especially New England, had improved themselves in 
woolen manufactures, “‘which, in its proportion, is as prejudicial 
to this Kingdom, as working of those Manufactures in Ireland,” 
it is accordingly suggested that “upon Occasion, the like Pro- 
hibitions be made with relation to” those northern colonies as 
to Ireland.! That Parliament was actuated by a similar thought 
is indicated by the position in the law of the clause relating to 
the colonies, — the nineteenth paragraph of an act otherwise 
concerned with the Irish problem. Consequently, whether we 
depend upon a careful reading of this nineteenth paragraph itself 
or view the paragraph in its logical and historical setting, we can 
arrive at but one tenable interpretation of that legislation: that 
Parliament intended to prevent merely the exportation of wool 
and wool manufactures, not the movement within the several 
colonies. To be sure, intercolonial trade was prohibited, since 
the several colonies were considered as distinct units. But there 
was no restraint such as suggested by Weeden, that no wool nor 
woolens could leave the premises of the local producer.’ 


1 Calendar of British State Papers, Colonial, xvii, 17. 
2 Some aspects of this legislation too detailed for the general discussion may be 
found in Appendix A. 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY 43 


For evidence outside the act itself, one may turn to the Repre- 
sentation, already mentioned, of the Commissioners for Trade 
and Plantations to the House of Commons. Speaking of com- 
modities in general, though presumably having the wool manu- 
facture chiefly in mind, the Commissioners excepted from the 
harmful activities of the colonists the production of ‘‘so much as 
should be wanting for their own Sustenance, and Supply of Pro- 
visions to their Neighbors.””! Then, various writers, as, for ex- 
ample, Sir William Keith in 1728 and John Adams in 1783, speak 
of the prohibition upon ‘‘export”’ or upon “‘water-borne”’ traffic in 
wool; but never of interference with local trade.2, Nor have I found 
a single statement of a contemporary giving the view held by 
Weeden and others. The act, then, merely imposed a prohibition 
of export or intercolonial shipment upon an industry which was as 
yet in the earliest stages of development, — on its face quite a 
harmless and useless proceeding. The reason for it, already inti- — 
mated, is probably that expressed in the recommendation of the 
Committee reporting the bill to the House of Commons: ‘That 
Care be taken to prevent the Setting up of the Woollen Manufac- 
ture in the English Plantations in America.” ® 

If the act itself was harmless, the difficulties of administration 
rendered the legislation still more innocuous. Unlike the portions 
of the legislation respecting the Irish industry, the paragraph per- 
taining to the colonial manufacture provided for no special means 
of enforcement, merely the Crown’s ordinary administrative off- 
cersin America. Such officers, few in number and subject in greater 
or less degree to local influences, were powerless to provide effective 
execution. For example, since the act forbade the placing of wool 
or woolen goods “‘on board any Ship or Vessel . . . upon any Pre- 
tense whatsoever,’ an attempt was made to prevent the shipment 
to coastal towns of wool grown upon Nantucket and other outlying 
islands where, by reason of the protection from wolves, wool- 
growing had early prospered. Of this matter the Surveyor of Cus- 

1 Journal of the House of Commons, xii, 427. 

2 New Jersey Archives, ust Series, v, 203; Callender, Economic History of the 
United States, p. 199. Cf. also Griffith, Sketches of the Early History of Maryland, 


1821, p. 39; and Smith, Memoirs of Wool, ii, 264, note. 
3 Journal of the House of Commons, xii, 532. 


AA THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


toms in New England wrote in 1704: “‘Since the wool act, we have 
used our endeavor to prevent the carrying of wool from the islands 
to the main, but I do not think it possible wholly to prevent it, for 
some of the islands lie very near — within a half or a quarter of a 
mile of the main. The country is large and the officers so few, that 
it may be carried in boats and canoes, in the night, from one place 
to another, notwithstanding all that the officers can do.” !_ More- 
over, attention has already been directed to the occasional trade in 
wool fabrics between colonies.” It may be noted further that the 
attitude subsequently assumed by the Board of Trade with respect 
to the colonial wool manufacture was not one likely to lead to a 
vigorous enforcement of this particular law.® 

After the passage of the Woolens Act, the further activity of 
Parliament itself was confined to the enactment of two minor laws 
supplementary to the act of 1699. With the apparent intent of 
closing every loophole for possible evasion of the Woolens Act, it 
was provided in the year following the enactment of that act, that 


no mariner nor passenger upon a vessel should purchase in the colo- 


nies more than forty shillings’ worth of woolen goods.* Again, to 
give greater facility to the trade in woolen cloths from England to 
the plantations, a further act of this same year 1700 abolished the 
export duties which previously had been in force upon such fabrics 
leaving England.® The close proximity of these several acts and 
the subsequent inaction of Parliament ® suggest that after a mo- 
mentary alarm over “the Setting up of the Woollen Manufacture 
in the English Plantations in America,” interest in the subject 
flagged; and, as has already appeared, nothing occurred in the 


1 Lord, Industrial Experiments, p. 129. It will be recalled that charges had been 
made of the exportation of wool from Nantucket to France, and hence enforcement 
of the new law was presumably directed with some special attention to this point. 

2 See above, pp. 30-33. 3 See below, pp. 45-46. 

4 rr and 12 William III, ch. 13. 5 zr and 12 William ITI, ch. 20. 

6 It may be noted that certain laws, the extension of which to the colonies might 
have been hurtful, were not so extended: 5 George I, ch. 27, 1719, which forbade the 
transporting or seducing of artificers to settle abroad; 23 George II, ch. 13, 1750, 
which prohibited the exportation of tools and utensils employed in the woolen and 
silk trades; while 14 George III, ch. 71, 1774, which laid a similar prohibition upon 
the export of tools or utensils used in the cotton and linen industries, contained a 
special provision excepting wool cards shipped to North America. 


ee ee ee ee 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY 45 


course of the colonial wool manufacture during the later years of 
the colonial period really to reawaken apprehension concerning 
that manufacture. 

The interference of the home government was, accordingly, con- 
fined thereafter to the operations of the Board of Trade, acting 
usually through the colonial governors or other administrative 
officers. As has just been suggested, the attitude of the Board of 
Trade toward the colonial wool manufacture was not oppressive. 
For instance, in 1706, certain London merchants petitioned that 
the planters be compelled to clothe their white, black, and Indian 
slaves or servants in woolen cloths of English production; but the 
Board would not endorse such a move, and pointed out its imprac- 
ticality.1. Or again, when a complete prohibition of woolen manu- 
facture in the colonies was asked for, the Board did not favor the 
measure, since then, as it said, the poor could not clothe themselves, 
— though, on the other hand, it was willing to forbid the exposing 
for sale of colonial-madefabrics.? Apparently, too, the Board appre- 
hended the peculiar economic situation of the northern colonies, the 
chief offenders against the dictates of the Mercantilist spirit in 
England’s colonial policy. In 1717, the Board spoke of these dis- 
tricts as being ‘‘under the necessity of applying themselves”’ to the 
woolen, linen, and other manufactures; and, in 1721, even more 
pointedly, it said that presumably “necessity and not choice has 
put them to erecting manufactures.” ® 

Wherefore, the Board and through it the government confined 
themselves to a negative policy, or perhaps better a policy of diver- 
sion. It was their purpose — strictly in keeping with the Mercan- 
tilistic thought of the times — to encourage the colonies “to supply 
us with such commodities as we are necessitated to purchase from 

1 Lord, Industrial Experiments, p. 130. Joshua Gee, writing in 1747, proposed 
that al] sale of woolen goods be forbidden in the colonies, private sales as well as 
those at any market or fair; that negroes be prohibited from combing or spinning 
wool, or from weaving woolen or linen cloth; and that all weavers be licensed by the 
colonial governors, so that industries might be watched and encouraged or dis- 
couraged according “‘to their wants, or the danger of their too much interfering with 
us” (Trade and Navigation of Great Britain Considered, pp. 142-144). 

2 Representation of the Board, 1728; quoted in Dickerson, American Colonial 


Government, p. 310, note. 
3 Dickerson, p. 309. 


46 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


foreigners with our money.” ? More specifically, and in the Board’s 
own words, ‘‘we humbly propose that these people particularly in 
New England and New York should be diverted from that under- 
taking (the manufacture of woolen cloth) by being encouraged in 
the production of naval stores, since in return of such stores, they 
would take off considerable quantities of woolen manufactures 
from hence, which would be a double advantage to this Kingdom.” ? 
By reason of the primary importance to England of her navy and 
merchant marine, of the consequent objections to drawing naval 
supplies from foreign nations, and of the gradual failure of the 
Baltic sources, the direct benefits to be secured from a large Ameri- 
can production of pitch, resin, masts, timber, and the like were 
fully as important as the indirect benefit. By bounties, by the ex- 
hortation and personal influence of colonial governors, and by other 
measures, diversion of the colonists to this field of productive 
activity was sought. Under what difficulties this propaganda pro- 
ceeded, and with what effect upon the supply of naval stores, it is 
not our province to inquire; * but as regards the wool manufacture, 
it appears that little or no change resulted. ‘The domestic wool- 
cloth production had too firm a root, and was too expressive of the 
economic conditions of the times. Accordingly, as has already been 
indicated, it continued to play the predominant part in the supply 
of woolen cloths of the colonies.® 

1 New Jersey Archives, ist Series, v, 309. 

2 Dickerson, p. 300. 

3 Sometimes other products, such as salt, potash, wines, and even silk were also 
encouraged; but the main stress was laid on naval stores. The source of such stores 
was naturally the outlying districts for the most part, the regions most likely to set 
upon cloth manufacture. The New England colonies, North Carolina, and to a 
lesser extent the other colonies, were affected. 

4 See particularly Lord, Industrial Experiments, pp. 56-124. 

5 The Board of Trade also maintained a general supervision over the develop- 
ment of colonial industries, particularly the wool manufacture. To this end “‘cer- 
tain general Queries”? were sent to the several governors in America, of which 
several related to trade and manufactures, beginning in 1719 and being repeated 
“as often as necessity required,” or “from Time to Time,” until 1733-1734. Again 
in 1766, at the commencement of the pre-Revolutionary unrest, the Board sent out 
a circular requiring ‘‘a particular and exact account of the several Manufactures 
which have been set up and carried on since 1734,” and that an annual report be 


made thereafter. Incidentally it may be noted that much of our data upon the 
state of the industries during this period are derived from answers to these demands. 


GOVERNMENTAL POLICY 47 


Taken as a whole, the interference of the British government 
was of negligible importance in checking or modifying the general 
development of the woolen industry in the colonies, and in that re- 
spect corresponds roughly with the more modern view of the eco- 
nomic effects upon the American “‘plantations” of the early British 
colonial policy. Far from regarding manufacture similar to that of 
Englishmen as ‘‘a sort of forgery, punishable, like an imitation of 
the British coin,’’! the government in this case seemed content 
merely to remove all threat to England’s export trade, allowing the 
domestic production to proceed as it would. Under conditions of a 
greatly expanded colonial development, to be sure, there lay in the 
encircling bonds of the Woolens Act, if well enforced, a possibility 
of serious conflict between the mother country and her children, 
especially in the prohibition of intercolonial traffic in wool or wool 
products; but, as our survey of the actual situation in the colonial 
industry would suggest, the conflict never became imminent dur- 
ing the whole period of political dependence.” 

1 Bancroft, History of the United States, ii, 520. 

2 The experience of the American wool-manufacturing industry may perhaps be 
contrasted with that of the Irish industry with which it was linked in the Woolens 
Act. While the former proceeded without appreciable alteration, the latter was 


virtually set back a century in development, the organization permitting an export 
trade being practically stamped out within a few years. 


CHAPTER III 
IMPORTATIONS 


A KNOWLEDGE of the conditions of colonial domestic production, 
—its quality, and the area and magnitude of its operations, — 
suggests, by process of inference, the nature of the import move- 
ment of wool products. It is obvious, for example, that no con- 
siderable trade in semi-manufactured goods, such as tops and 
yarns, was possible. In fact, no reference to such importations 
appears in colonial records. Again, it is evident that by reason of 
wars and misadventures in the colonial export trade the course of 
importations wouid be largely irregular, probably more irregular 
than in later times. Another feature of the period, making for a 
simplification of the import trade, was the prohibition of ship- 
ment to British colonies of cloths other than the product of the 
mother country.! 

It has become apparent in the foregoing discussion that the 
market for imported fabrics was relatively circumscribed. Prob- 
ably it was true, as one writer remarked, that the colonists’ 
“delight was to wear English manufactures;”’ * but disability fre- 
quently interfered with the satisfaction of their desires. The use 
of English cloths in the regions which lay away from the coast, or 
lacked easy transportation facilities, or possessed few acceptable 
export commodities, was undoubtedly small indeed. Such were 
the interior communities of the New England colonies, and to 
some extent those of the middle and southern provinces. The re- 
maining area, that which might offer a market for English woolens, 
included chiefly the northern towns and commercial centers, and 
a considerable portion of the planter colonies: Maryland, Vir- 
ginia, and South Carolina. Of the more northerly communities, 
much has already been said as to their economic position. It 

1 Douglass, British Settlements, 1755, ii, 266, note. 


2 “Letter to member of Parliament, 1720,” quoted by Lord, Industrial Experi- 
ments, p. 126. 


48 


IMPORTATIONS 49 


will, therefore, suffice to add the statement of Joshua Gee, who, 
speaking apparently of the provinces in general, said in 1747: 
that ‘‘ New England and the northern colonies have not commodi- 
ties and products enough to send us in return for purchasing 
their necessary clothing, etc., but are under very great difficul- 
ties.” 1 Yet in the towns there existed a demand, —moderate in 
volume, to be sure, —for well-finished wool fabrics. Such cloths, 
it has already appeared, were not forthcoming from the domes- 
tic household manufacture. Probably on the score of quality 
this demand could not have been satisfied by household prod- 
ucts. Accordingly, reliance upon foreign goods was found here 
to be necessary, in so far as the local handicraftsmen did not 
meet the requirements either in quantity or quality. Probably, 
too, such reliance was frequently a profitable affair. Bennett, 
the historian, in reference to “‘almost all sorts of English goods, 
but more especially clothing for men, women, and children,” 
states that ““‘workmen’s wages are so high in this part of the 
World, that they (the people) find it cheaper to import them from 
London.” ? Again, it was estimated by British authorities that 
in America high wages made it cost 20 per cent more to manu- 
facture linen, and 50 per cent more to produce woolen cloths 
than in England.’ 

Of the plantation colonies, evidence is abundant as to the ex- 
tent of their dependence upon England. Beverley wrote in 1705 
of the Virginians that “they have their clothing of all sorts from 
England, as linen, woollen and silk, hats and leather.” * The 
inhabitants of Maryland were said a few years later ‘‘to wear the 
like Cloathing and have the same furniture within their houses 
with those in this Kingdom (England). The slaves are cloathed 
with Cottons, Kerseys, flannel, and coarse linens, all imported.” ® 


1 Trade and Navigation of Great Britain Considered, p. 171. 

2 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 1860-1862, p. 111 (quoted 
in Beer, Commercial Policy of England, p. 80). 

3 “Report of fhe Board of Trade, 1728,” in New Jersey Archives, v, 208-209. 
The references to ‘‘workmen’s wages” or ‘‘wages” indicate quite conclusively that 
the writers were thinking of the town conditions. In the colonial period a wage- 
earning class outside the towns may be said to have been practically nonexistent. 

4 Quoted in Beer, p. 70. 5 New York Colonial Documents, v, 606. 


50 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


Imports of wool cloths into South Carolina in 1761 were re- 
corded as including ‘‘finest broadcloth down to negro cloth... 
blankets, flannels, and woolen stockings.” ! Apparently, then, 
right up to the disturbances which heralded the Revolutionary 
War, the southern colonies continued to secure a large portion 
of their requirements for wool cloth from England. 

That the American market for such British goods was not 
larger may be in part attributed to the natural disadvantages, 
or a combination of natural and artificial disadvantages, attend- 
ing the importation from the mother country. The freight 
charges of that period were without doubt peculiarly heavy, 
judged by modern standards. For example, we know that as 
late as 1775 the average charges covering land-carriage, insur- 
ance, and commissions, for goods shipped from the north of Eng- 
land to America through London were 32 per cent of their value, 
exclusive of ocean freight.2 In consequence, perhaps, one should 
not be surprised to find that in 1685 English worsted serge sold in 
Connecticut at an advance of over 100 per cent upon its London 
cost,? and that at other times (1706 and 1709) figures of 150 and 
200 per cent were reported.* But, apparently, at times and in 
certain places, prices were increased somewhat higher than neces- 
sary to cover minimum costs. It is interesting, for example, to 
find in Maryland that early in the eighteenth century ‘‘the trader 
(or merchant) gets as much for his goods as he can in tobacco, hav- 
ing always the whip-hand of the planters’ necessity for cloths and 
tools,” °— a foreshadowing of that evil debt relation which was 
to be the lot of the southern plantation-owner in so many later 


1 Historical Collections of South Carolina (Carroll’s), ii, 229. Cf. also letter of a 
Georgia planter ordering negro cloths in London: Georgia Historical Society, Col- 
lections, vi, 15-17. Furthermore, see Joshua Gee’s statement: “‘the Tobacco Plan- 
tations take from England their Cloathing, Household Goods, Iron Manufactures 
...and almost everything else that may be called the Manufacture of England” 
(Trade and Navigation of Great Britain Considered, 3rd Edition, 1731, pp. 20-21). 

* Clark, p. 148, quoting from “‘ British Transcripts in Library of Congress.” For 
more modern figures, see Review of Economic Statistics, July, 1919. 

3 Connecticut Public Records, iii, 185, note. 

4 Bishop, i, 330; Documents relative to New York Colonial History, v, 460; Dicker- 
son, American Colonial Government, p. 304, note. 

5 Archives of Maryland, xxv, 604. 


IMPORTATIONS 51 


decades. In sum, then, with astounding enhancements in price 
due to natural or other causes, it is easily comprehensible that 
the colonial market would be likely to be relatively small, and 
that the domestic household production of woolens supplemented 
by the partially or wholly handicraft manufacture of worsteds 
would supply the great bulk of colonial needs. 

In correspondence with the chief characteristics of the colonial 
market, the qualities of cloth imported were principally of two 
types, the better qualities of fabrics for the upper classes of the 
northern towns and for the planters, and the cheap grades for the 
poorer elements of the towns — in so far as they did not keep up 
a partially sufficient household manufacture — and for the plant- 
ers’ slaves. Broadcloth, a standard English fabric of a superior 
variety and as yet not made in the colonies, was an important 
article in the trade. Likewise important were worsteds, — shal- 
loons, calimancoes, camblets, and the like. In the second qual- 
ity-group were duffells, friezes, coarse kerseys and negro cloths. 
The medium qualities of fabrics doubtless were not wholly neg- 
lected. Apparently flannel and blankets were frequently brought 
in. Presumably their sale was pretty closely confined to the 
towns, — this being especially true of flannels of which there 
was a substantial household production in the country areas. 
Blankets may have commanded a somewhat wider distribution, 
since most of the country looms were narrow affairs and could 
not weave up the farmers’ needs for this article. Yet here I 
am inclined to think substitutes in the form of feather beds, 
comforters, and the like would restrict the domestic sales of 
imported blankets. On the whole, medium-grade fabrics seem 
not to have been significant factors in the import trade. To 
be sure, just what the proportions among these various quali- 
ties of fabrics were around 1760, it is impossible to determine. 
My own impression is that the groups first mentioned, the 
superior and the specially cheap, considerably surpassed the 
medium quality in importance.' 

1 Some idea of the differences in quality may be obtained by an examination of 


prices, though information upon prices is meager. Bishop (i, 344) gives the quali- 
ties of cloths imported as broad and narrow fabrics between 6s. and 12s. a yard, and 


52 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


Data regarding the volume of the import trade in wool fabrics, 
though fragmentary in character, indicate clearly the rapid in- 
crease of that commerce. For the seventeenth century the ref- 
erences are of course only casual and in rough terms, as when in 
1657 John Hull of Boston noted in his diary that three ships had 
arrived from London with clothing.1 Information concerning this 
period suggests that for most of the colonies no organized and 
regular trade had been established. By 1721, however, the move- 
ment had reached fair proportions. Statistics covering the ex- 
port of wool cloth and other commodities from England, the first 
orderly figures for that traffic, show that the value of wool 
fabrics shipped from the mother country had attained £147,000. 
Beside this figure the value of other British-made textiles sent 
from England, £30,000, appears diminutive. Indeed, of all tex- 
tiles, foreign or British, exported from England, these British wool 
manufactures formed more than half on the basis of value. 
Moreover, they amounted to a third of the whole export trade 
from Great Britain to the provinces.? At approximately the same 
time (1728), Sir William Keith, former governor of Pennsylvania, 
represented that the colonies ‘‘took off and consumed” a sixth of 
the wool manufacture of the mother country.’ 

Not until the years just preceding the Revolutionary War were 
further statistics gathered as to the British trade in wool fabrics. 
At that time, for the years 1772 to 1774, the average annual ex- 


duffells and friezes from 3s. 6d. to 6s.a yard. Broadcloth is elsewhere (Clark, p. 140) 
said to have retailed throughout the colonial period at about $2 to $3 per yard; 
serges, an inferior worsted fabric, in the seventeenth century at 70 cents to $1.10 
a yard; and kerseys, in Philadelphia, between 1721 and 1731 at 50 to 60 cents a yard. 
On the other hand, Weeden (Appendix) gives the value of colonial plain cloth in 
1713 at 1s. 3d. a yard, and of drugget at r2d. Linsey-woolsey, a staple domestic 
fabric, was valued in probate records at only 15 cents a yard in 1690 (Clark, 
Pp. 141). 

Joshua Gee makes an interesting comment upon the character of the wool fabrics 
exported to the northern colonies: “‘Any ordinary sort sells with them, and when 
they are grown out of fashion with us, they are new fashioned enough there; and 
therefore those places are the great markets we have to dispose of such goods” 
(Trade and Navigation of Great Britain Considered, p. TEU: 

1 Weeden, p. 159. 

* Dickerson, American Colonial Government, p. 302. 

3 Bishop, i, 338. 


IMPORTATIONS 53 


portation of such goods amounted to approximately £775,000.! 
Such a startling increase over the figure for 1721, over 500 per 
cent, would at first thought seem to indicate an encroachment of 
the imported fabrics upon the area previously dominated by the 
colonial household system. However, the growth of population 
during this half century was also astounding, amounting to 400 to 
450 per cent.? The general level of English prices moved upward 
during this period, and presumably the prices of wool fabrics 
shipped to the colonies followed along. Accordingly, the increase 
in colonial per capita consumption could not have been consider- 
able. If, nevertheless, some moderate enhancement in per capita 
consumption did occur, it was probably of limited influence. 
Consumption in the towns and on the larger plantations would be 
chiefly affected; and, indeed, as lines of profitable commerce were 
opened up and as trade in tobacco and rice developed, such local 
increase of consumption is wholly credible.2 At most, then, this 
enhancement in total volume of imported fabrics between 1721 
and 1772-1774 occasioned, it seems, merely a diminution in the 
household production within or close by the towns, with perhaps 
some increase of consumption in the South as the plantation sys- 
tem became more widely established. 

The statistics for 1772-1774 are of further interest in showing 
the relative proportions of the trade taken by the several sections 
of the country. New England, despite an early settlement, a con- 
siderable increase of population, and a wide-flung commerce, was 
able to take but little over a quarter (27 per cent) of the total. 
The middle colonies of New York and Pennsylvania took half as 


1 Macpherson, Annals of Commerce, iii, 602. These statistics are as follows: 

















1772 1773 1774 1775 1776 
mew (england. 5-2. sf. £284,553 £147,717 £168,815 £8,382 £15,657 
New York and Pennsylvania . . 344,934 211,617 346,752 555 ete 
Maryland, Virginia, Carolina, 

Regi sinters pete yg es 206,155 189,695 239,900 40,831 
Lote tl Baa Be ee ae £925,642 £549,029 £755,467 £49,768 £15,657 


2 Clark, pp. 102-103. From a population of roughly half a million in 1720, the 
country is supposed to have increased to over two and a quarter million whites and 
half a million negroes by 1775. 

8 Clark (p. 110) reaches the conclusion that ‘‘not improbably the per capita con- 
sumption (of imported wool fabrics) rose somewhat” in the half century after 1720. 


54 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


much again (40.5 per cent), explicable both on the ground of a 
sizable town population and on the facilities within these colonies 
for an appreciable internal trade up the rivers. Thus, for example, 
it was reported that the people of Albany were clothed wholly in 
imported fabrics.1 The southern colonies, finally, took nearly a 
third of the whole importation (32.5 per cent), a large proportion 
in view of the late development in some sections, and of the lower 
value per unit of quantity for much of the cloth consumed in the 
South. However, such a share for the southern area is not an 
unexpected phenomenon when the features of the domestic manu- 
facture are understood. 

It may be added with respect to these figures for 1772-1774 
that at that time the exportation to the colonies formed approxi- 
mately a sixth (in the single year 1772 a fifth) of the total British 
export trade in wool goods.” James states with regard to this 
later colonial period that ‘‘after the home trade, probably the 
most beneficial in every respect was the export of woolen and 
worsted fabrics to our American plantations.” * Under these 
circumstances it is not to be wondered at that the British of- 
ficials kept reasonably close watch of the American wool manu- 
facture, or again that in the retaliatory measures favored by the 
colonies at the time of the Stamp Act and later disturbances, 
a self-sufficiency in wool fabrics was advocated. 

With respect to the import trade in general, there remains only 
to note the organization of that movement. Upon this point 
Joshua Gee throws some light. He remarks that wool goods “are 
generally sent (to America) at the risk of the shop-keepers and 
traders of England, who are the great exporters, and not the in- 
habitants of the colonies, as some have imagined.”’ The local rep- 
resentatives of the English exporters are said to be “young 
merchants who have not stocks of their own; and therefore all 
our plantations are filled with such who receive the consignments 
of their friends from hence; and when they have got a sufficient 

1 Lord, Industrial Experiments, p. 133. 

2 Inasmuch as Sir William Keith’s somewhat similar estimate for 1728 (one- 
sixth of England’s wool-cloth production going to the colonies) was only a rough 


figure, no comparison with the above is attempted. 
3 History of Worsted Manufacture in England, p. 186. 


IMPORTATIONS 5 


stock to trade with, they generally return home and other young 
men take their place.” 1 Within the country, the goods were 
probably sold in large measure through individual negotiations of 
the importers and the local merchants, but the auction method 
was also sometimes employed.” The latter system, offering a 
quick and cheap manner of selling goods which were likely to 
arrive in large quantities, was destined to play an increasing part 
in the American distributive organization for imported fabrics. 


1 Trade and Commerce of Great Britain Considered, pp. 171-172. He continued 
quaintly: “so that the continual motion and intercourse our people have into the 
colonies, may be compared to the bees of a hive, which go out empty, and come 
back again loaded.” 

2 Examples may be drawn from most colonial newspapers. For example, in the 
Boston Gazette of January 11, 1768, appears the advertisement: ‘‘To be sold by 
Benjamin Church at his usual Place of Sale on Thursday evening next a Great 
Variety of valuable Articles, viz. Broad Cloths, Kerseys, Ranteens, Camblets,” etc. 
See again New Jersey Archives, Newspaper Extracts, v, 468, a quotation from 
the Pennsylvania Gazette of January 3, 1765, ““To be sold by Public Vendue... an 
assortment of goods... (including) broadcloths, coatings, shalloons, flannels... 
worsted stockings.” 


56 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 


CONCLUSION OF Part I. 


The distinctly colonial period of wool manufacture drew to a 
close about 1760. The disturbances accompanying the Stamp 
Act and other British tax measures, and the unsettled condition 
of commerce which was occasioned by the Revolutionary War, 
and later by the Franco-British warfare, ushered in a new era. 
There was, of course, no sharp break with the preceding de- 
velopment, — industrial history shows few sudden changes. In 
many ways a noteworthy feature of these later decades was to be 
the maintenance of the organization in wool manufacture which 
had characterized the colonial system, — the household produc- 
tion. Certain underlying conditions, indeed, were for many 
years antagonistic to any real transformation of the industry. 
The wool supply was too poor in quality for the manufacture of 
cloths which could compete in the open market with English 
fabrics, and the growing of wool had as yet not reached the com- 
mercial stage. Again, technical advance had not really begun. 
Practically none of the improvements in apparatus which were 
the concomitants of the Industrial Revolution in England had 
reached America as yet, nor had an independent evolution ap- 
peared. But chiefly no market for domestic fabrics existed suf- 
ficiently large in scope to encourage the expansion of operations 
in the local industry. The market for “boughten”’ cloth was 
narrow in 1760, and the trade therein small. Again, the existing 
market was so situated that English fabrics could be readily in- 
troduced, and was at the time firmly wedded to the (as yet) 
superior cloths derived through importation. ‘Thus a vicious 
circle was created: cloths inferior to the English would not find 
favor in the restricted and prejudiced domestic market, and yet 
neither the quality of the domestic wool nor the status of the 
local technique was conducive to the production of competitive 
fabrics. The industry, then, had perforce to undergo a transi- 
tional period during which conditions conducive to factory opera- 
tions could be attained. ; 





/ 
» 
a 
. 


PART II 
THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 








INTRODUCTION 


IN the transitional period which succeeded the simpler colonial 
era, the essential feature was the appearance and development 
of the factory. Nothing in nature approaching a factory had 
existed in the earlier times. The highest industrial form was that 
of the workshop, either of the southern plantation or of the handi- 
craft worsted worker in the towns. By the third decade of the 
nineteenth century, however, the factory had become the char- 
acteristic type of industrial organization in the American wool 
manufacture. It had not, indeed, prevailed over the whole pro- 
duction of wool fabrics. The household method of manufacture 
had a strong root and was specially adapted to certain economic 
conditions, — economic conditions which, in the westward settle- 
ment of the United States, came to be repeated over and over 
again. Moreover, the representative factory was a distinctly 
small affair. Yet in the eastern communities, which in most in- 
dustrial matters set the pace for the rest of the country, the 
factory of this limited sort had become the typical form of or- 
ganization by 1830, — in some respects the dominant form. The 
older method of manufacture might in some localities and sec- 
tions of the country still retain its earlier strength; in others its 
power might yet increase for a time; but its decline and ultimate 
disappearance could be forecast. The young, factory form of 
manufacture had proved itself. For this reason, the steady prog- 
ress of development in the industry may be broken arbitrarily 
at this date, approximately 1830, in order that we may inquire 
more fully into the status of the manufacture at that time, 
even as similarly we fixed upon 1760 as a convenient date for 
examining the typical colonial method of production. 

At first thought a jump of seventy years may seem unreason- 
able. Only ninety years have elapsed between 1830 and the pres- 
ent time, and these years, as will appear, have been divided into 
two further periods. Yet a closer examination of the decades 


59 


60 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


following 1760 gives justification for this long leap. Of special 
influence in prolonging the formative period was the number 
of false starts which attended the commencement of the more 
advanced manufacture. A survey of this whole period if hastily 
made might well suggest to the observer that there was an un- 
interrupted evolution throughout its course, — from the time 
when operations on something more than a household or handi- 
craft system were first attempted to the acquisition of the com- 
plete and intrenched factory form. Such, however, would be 
wide of the truth. For example, after a few years of progress, 
including even the space of the Revolutionary War, there was a 
reaction which left the industry at a point not far from that at 
which it had started. Probably experience thus dearly bought 
with the failures of early establishments and the disappointment 
of high hopes was necessary and on the whole advantageous; and 
to be sure each new venture was initiated under more promising 
auspices. But equally important in prolonging this formative 
period was the time required for securing the firm foundation 
upon which further and more definite advance might be assured. 
Only with aggravating slowness, step by step, could the prepara- 
tion be accomplished, —in improvement of wool supply, in better- 
ment of technical equipment, and the like. Yet only when the 
preparation was relatively complete could the young factory be 
pushed forward with confidence in its success and with any con- 
siderable vigor. 


CHAPTER IV 


EARLY ATTEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION 


INITIATED by the agitation which centered around the Stamp 
Act, there came a series of popular demonstrations, extending 
over the next half century, in favor of domestic manufactures, in 
which demand for a larger domestic production of wool fabrics 
always played a prominent part. Ina considerable measure these 
demonstrations worked themselves out in mere effervescence, but 
they were not without real influence upon the course of develop- 
ment, at least in the wool manufacture. Particularly they seem 
to have awakened in various individuals a zeal for a more effec- 
tive domestic production, which persisted after the popular 
excitement had died down and which brought important contri- 
butions to the advance of the industry. 

The events of the first movement, that evoked by the Stamp 
Act, may be taken as typical of those which followed. In this 
instance, feeling perhaps ran exceptionally high by reason of the 
novelty of the situation. Merchants agreed not to import British 
wool fabrics, orders previously given were canceled, and with 
some exceptions, of course, the people, rich as well as poor, 
dressed in homespun, and to conserve the wool supply vowed to 
eat no lamb.! In 1766 the Daughters of Liberty at Providence 
held all-day sessions in spinning. Premiums were offered by vol- 
untary societies to encourage the growth of raw materials.? In 
Massachusetts, in 1768, several of his Majesty’s Council and 
many members of the House of Representatives as well as a num- 


1 Weeden, p. 719. The forebodings of trouble are quaintly expressed in a Boston 
dispatch to the Connecticut Courant, October 29, 1764: “‘It is fear’d by many who 
wish well to Great Britain, that the new A t of P t will greatly distress, if 
not totally ruin some of HER own manufactures. — It is thought that by means of 
this A t, less of her woollen cloths, to the amount of some thousands sterling, 
will be purchased in this cold climate the insuing winter.” 

2 Weeden, p. 732. 











61 


62 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


ber of the Clergy were reported to have appeared “‘completely 
cloathed in the Manufacture of this Country.” At Commence- 
ment in 1769 the president and graduating class at the Rhode 
Island College were clad in homespun, an example which was 
followed at Harvard the succeeding year.?, And apparently such 
enthusiasm was not without its effect upon the general public. 

Unquestionably there was an outburst of domestic production 
unlike anything that had gone before. East Hartford, Connecti- 
cut, was reported to be weaving 17,000 yards of cloth annually.’ 
The borough of Elizabeth, New Jersey, produced ‘upwards of 
100,000 yards of linen and woolen cloth” during 1769.4 Mer- 
chants began to carry and advertise domestic woolens, such goods 
were sold at auction, and markets for their sale were established.® 
The manufacture of broadcloth was attempted for the first time.® 
But, more important for our purpose, enterprises partaking of the 
nature of factories were attempted. Of two of them no detailed 
data are available: those at Brookfield, Massachusetts, and in 
Somerset County, Maryland.’ We know more of William Moli- 
neaux’s establishment in Boston. It started in as a Spinning 
School in 1769, aided by public contribution. Within a year’s 
time, in a petition to the Legislature, he asserted that he had al- 
ready ‘‘learned”’ at least three hundred children and women to 
spin “in the most compleat manner.” ‘Thereafter he added 
warping and twisting mills, looms (by the terms of his lease he 
was to keep ten looms constantly busy weaving worsteds), and 
some finishing and dyeing apparatus.’ Just what he produced, 

1 Boston Gazette, January 11, 1768. 

2 Weeden, p. 732, and Census of 1860, ili, p. xxix. 

3 Massachusetts Gazette, January 14, 1768. 

4 New Jersey Archives, Newspaper Extracts, vili, 195. 

5 Contemporary newspapers, e. g., Boston Gazelte, September 19, 1768; Enoch 
Brown ‘‘Informs those Persons who are desirous of Promoting our Own Manufac- 
tures as well as serving themselves: That he takes in all Sorts of Country-made 
Cloths at his Store on Boston Neck, either on Commissions, or in Exchange for any 
kind of West-India Goods at a reasonable Rate.”’ Also, Weeden, p. 732; Scharf and 
Westcott, History of Philadelphia, iii, 2227. 

6 Census of 1860, ili, pp. Xxvill, xxxix; Hazard, College Tom, p. 101; New Jersey 
Archives, xxvi, 157; Bishop, i, 377. 


7 Warden, Account of the United States, 1810, li, 161. 
8 Bagnall, pp. 42, 47, 48; Bishop, i, 375-376; Clark, pp. 189-190. 





EARLY ATTEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION 63 


and particularly whether or not this was more than an expanded 
workshop of a worsted handicraftsman, are questions it is im- 
possible to answer definitively. But Clark is right in that it was 
the nearest approach to a textile factory of which we have any 
real knowledge before the Revolutionary War. 

In a manner somewhat similar to the above, the outburst of 
popular feeling which ushered in the Revolutionary War led not 
only to a signed agreement among Philadelphia butchers not to 
slaughter sheep and to like demonstrations of zeal for domestic 
- Industries,? but also to the organization in that city of ‘‘The 
United Company for Promoting American Manufactures.” The 
spinning was given out to household workers for the most part, al- 
thoughaspinning jenny of twenty-four spindles is reported as part 
of the concern’s equipment at one time. Later, when in 1787 the 
Company was revived, it possessed four jennies carrying a total of 
two hundred and twenty-four spindles, a carding machine, and 
twenty-six looms. However, one cannot ascertain just how large 
a part the spinning and weaving of wool played in this establish- 
ment, or how much of this equipment was woolen machinery. In 
common with many of the early textile enterprises, the United 
Company did not tie itself to any one material. Cotton, flax, 
and wool were all employed, and seemingly the former two bulked 
largest. At one time during the war, Samuel Wetherill, Jr., who 
seems to have been a leading spirit in the endeavor and to have 
somehow secured control of the establishment, contracted with 
the government to supply woolen cloth, though it is not def- 
initely known that any of this cloth was actually delivered; and 
again in 1782 he advertised everlastings and coatings among the 
fabrics, chiefly linen, which were for sale at his “‘manufactory.”’ 
In the resuscitated company of 1787, the principal products were 
surely cotton and linen fabrics. While, then, one should pre- 
sumably designate this concern as an immature factory, he is 

1 Clark, p. 190. Apparently the enterprise was continued until the death of the 
promoter in 1774. See Massachusetts Gazette, December 16, 1774: advertisement 
of the sale ‘‘by Public Vendue at the Province Manufacturing House”’ of all the 
looms, warping, twisting and other machines, ‘‘ Dying Presses, etc.” belonging to 


the estate of William Molineaux. 
2 Bishop, i, 381. 


64 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


doubtful whether to call it an immature woolen factory. More- 
over, with the mixture of textile materials and the paucity of 
definite information, one can learn from this episode little of a 
detailed character as to the state of the organized wool manu- 
facture at that time.! 

Beyond this establishment, in part the fruition of patriotic zeal, 
there was no enterprise of note. A subsidy of £300 toward the 
erection of a factory was given to Edward Parker of Cecil County, 
Maryland, by the state legislature; but nothing more is 
known of his endeavor.? In addition, there were several small 
establishments in Virginia and Maryland, such as that of Charles 
Carroll of Carrollton and that of Robert Carter of Aires, Vir- 
ginia. Apparently, however, these were only enlarged plantation 
workshops, where negroes, even up to the number of thirty, 
worked under the supervision of experienced white artisans.? The 
times; then, were not ripe for factory production on any con- 
siderable scale.* 

The first purely wool-manufacturing concern founded on a 
strictly business basis, and the first in which power machinery was 
employed,° as well as the first wool-working enterprise of which 
any considerable data are available, was one launched at Hart- 
ford, Connecticut, in 1788. ‘The initial capital for the enterprise 
consisted of £1250, in part raised by means of a subscription 
paper circulated in Hartford and neighboring towns. Later a 
capital of £2800 was reported. To these private efforts was 
added the patronage of the state. With particular regard for 
this Hartford venture, all buildings used as woolen factories were 


1 For data concerning this enterprise, see Bishop, i, 387-388; Scharf and West- 
cott, op. cit., 111, 2314; Bagnall, pp. 63-64, 71; Clark, pp. 183, 190, 226. 

2 Johnston, History of Cecil County, p. 324. 

’ Documentary History of American Industrial Society, li, 274, 314-316, 326-327. 

4 Cases of the employment of household workers in the putting-out of spinning 
and weaving — cases which are encountered but rarely in American experience 
— are referred to below, pp. 192, 224-225. 

5 Bishop (i, 376) thinks there was some sort of power machinery in the Moli- 
neaux factory of 1769, since “two boys only” were stated to wind and twist yarn 
for fifty looms. It is problematical what sort of machine was referred to, and 
whether it applied to cotton, woolen, or linen yarn. Perhaps it was a cop-building 
machine, which could be worked by a foot-treddle. 





EARLY ATTEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION 65 


exempted from taxation for five years and all workmen therein 
from payment of the poll tax for two years. Furthermore, a 
bounty of one penny per pound was given for all yarn spun in the 
factory at Hartford before June 1, 1789. This, however, did not 
suffice to put the concern on its feet. Other appeals for aid fol- 
lowed; and in response, a lottery of £1000 was granted (1790), 
the avowed purpose of which was to provide funds for the pur- 
chase of machinery. This device actually yielded nearly twice 
that amount. Then to these pecuniary aids should be joined the 
interest taken in the enterprise by public men: Washington 
visited the establishment during his eastern tour, inspected it, 
and ordered cloth; Hamilton commended it in his Report on 
Manufactures as a “precious embryo;”’ and it is probable that 
it attracted much attention from other patriots of the time.! 
Though it was announced in 1792 that ‘‘this manufacture, after 
struggling with every obstacle, begins to flourish, and bids fair 
to be advantageous to the proprietors as well as to the public,” 
the hoped-for success was in fact never attained.? 

The difficulties in launching the enterprise are narrated in the 
petitions to the Legislature for assistance, — difficulties in get- 
ting machinery and suitable buildings, in finding proper materials, 
and in securing skilled labor or expert supervision. The ma- 
chines had to be purchased in the country, as England forbade 
the exportation of wool-working machinery; and for the first 
year or two these mechanisms comprised, it appears, only such 
apparatus as might have been found in any of the establishments 


1 As regards Hamilton, see Taussig, State Papers and Speeches on the Tariff, p. 99. 
Hamilton’s optimistic account should be given: “‘A promising essay towards the 
fabrication of cloths, cassimeres, and other woolen goods, is going on at Hartford, 
in Connecticut. Specimens of the different kinds which are made, in the possession 
of the secretary, evince that these fabrics have attained a very considerable degree © 
of perfection. Their quality certainly surpasses anything that could have been 
looked for in so short a time and under so great disadvantages, and conspires with 
the scantiness of the means which have been at the command of the directors to 
form the eulogium of that public spirit, perseverance and judgment which have 
been able to accomplish so much”’ (p. 98). 

2 Davis, Essays in the Earlier History of American Corporations, 1, 267. Other 
accounts of the Hartford enterprise are to be found in Bagnall, p. 1o1, seg., and 
North, Bulletin, 1899, pp. 139-147. . 


66 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


already considered, such as looms, a fulling mill, and some 
finishing machinery. According to Washington, the spinning in 
1792 was done wholly “‘by the country people, who are paid 
by the cut,” — presumably the spinning of both woolen and 
worsted yarns; and the machinery which it was proposed to buy 
from the receipts of the lottery was said to be ‘‘Spinning, Card- 
ing, and Scribbling Machines, to expedite the labor and reduce 
that (preparatory) part of the business.” 

Thereafter came a change of such importance as to justify the 
designation of this establishment as the first complete manufac- 
tory in the American industry devoted solely to wool: power- 
driven machines other than the old fulling mill were introduced, 
and the yarn spinning was brought within the factory walls. In 
1795, when the concern sold out its equipment, the machinery 
included two carding machines, a spinning jenny, and a twisting 
machine, besides eight looms, etc. Of the spinning jenny, we 
know little: it was procured during the last year or two of the 
company’s existence, was undoubtedly worked by hand, and 
probably was an adaptation of the jennies for cotton spinning, of 
which the earliest mentioned is one brought from England in 
1775.1 The carding machines were described by Henry Wansey, 
an English clothier, who visited the plant in 1794: ‘‘I saw two 
carding-engines, working by water, of a very inferior construc- 
tion. Two large center cylinders in each, with two doffers, and 
only two working cylinders, of the breadth of bare sixteen inches, 
said to be invented by some person there.” The performance was 
equally unsatisfactory, “‘the wool not being half worked;”’ and 
accordingly “‘the spinning (then done on spinning wheels) was 
very bad.” ? In addition, as already suggested, there was the 
difficulty of securing skilled labor and expert supervision. Men 
acquainted with the production of the finer woolen fabrics ob- 


1 This first spinning jenny was said to be suitable for spinning either wool or 
cotton (North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 256, quoting the Philadelphia Magazine); but it is 
doubtful if it was used for the former in the United Company above described, par- 
ticularly because the Hartford concern was so slow in adopting it. On the other 
hand, jennies were early employed in the cotton industry, though soon superseded 
by other machines (Clark, pp. 191-192, 424-425). 

2 Bagnall, p. 107. 





EARLY ATTEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION 67 


viously must have been scarce indeed in the country. In this 
regard Wansey stated: “None of the partners understands any- 
thing about (the manufacture), and all depends on an English- 
man who is a sorter of wool.” In a concern of such limited size 
skilled workmen were perhaps not so necessary as in later fac- 
tories. For expert supervision, however, there undoubtedly was 
need. Yet if one discounts the statements of this experienced 
foreigner, as probably he should, it is evident that technical diffi- 
culties were great. Effective production could not be expected. 

A second major obstacle in the way of successful manufacture 
was the difficulty in securing a satisfactory supply of raw ma- 
terial. Most of the wool must have come from domestic sources, 
but as yet there had come no substantial improvement in the 
quality of domestic sheep above the condition which obtained in 
latter days of the colonial period. Indeed, possibly the general 
character of the American clip had worsened in the interim. The 
mill seems to have procured some wool from Georgia, — at least 
so Wansey was told. This was ‘“‘very fine wool,” he remarked, 
‘but it was in bad condition.” 1 Even the company itself could 
praise the domestic fiber but faintly. Wool of this country, the 
proprietors said, when properly sorted, will make cloths “equal 
to British Seconds,’ presumably English second-best goods.? 
In the end, effort was made to get suitable foreign wool, and four 
thousand pounds at least were imported from Spain.? With 
suitable fiber so hard to secure, inevitably the price ruled high; 
and thus the power of the mill to compete with foreign-made 
cloths was the further lowered. But, more serious still, it is not 
improbable that the factory just could not find a sufficient quan- 
tity of wool in quality proper for the manufacture of cloths which 
would compare favorably with the imported goods.* 


1 Bagnall, p. 107. 

2 Ibid., pp. 104-105; quoting a memorial to the legislature. 

3 Bulletin, 1899, p. 142. 

4 Of course foreign-grown wools might in time have been secured in adequate 
volume to satisfy the needs of the concern. Just what difficulties such a scheme 
would meet, we cannot now gauge. At best, however, dependence on foreign sup- 
plies would make a less favorable basis for the development of factory production 
on any considerable scale than the existence of adequate domestic supply. 


68 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Finally, on the side of quality in production the enterprise also 
was handicapped. The existing market for ‘‘boughten” cloth was 
narrow by reason of the persisting large household production of 
wool fabrics, and, being largely limited to the towns, it demanded 
for the most part fabrics of relatively high grade, — fabrics such 
as were available by importation. Accordingly we find the es- 
tablishment engaged on goods generally of the finer qualities: 
superior woolens such as broadcloths and cassimeres. Inferior 
fabrics, e. g., coatings and ‘“‘everlastings,’’ were also manufac- 
tured; but the proportion between the finer and poorer grades of 
goods may perhaps be judged from the statement of Wansey, 
who found in the weave-shop two looms employed upon broad- 
cloth, two upon cassimeres with worsted warps, and only one 
upon narrow or “‘ferret” cloth. A young factory, however, could 
not hope to produce fine goods at once; and even the testimony 
of contemporaries favorably disposed to this Hartford enterprise 
is evidence that the production of the new mill fell short of the 
standard desired by the market. Washington was lukewarm. 
He wrote of the broadcloths that they “‘are not of the first qual- 
ity as yet, but they are good.”’ And Hamilton, although trying 
to speak as appreciatively as he could of the ‘’essay,’’ hesitated 
before a full commendation of its products.2 Moreover, the in- 
effectiveness of the Hartford goods in competition with imported 
fabrics gives further suggestion in this matter. 

The disposition of the cloth produced seems to have been in 
the hands of local storekeepers and sometimes of merchants in 
New York to whom the cloth was consigned. But seemingly 
neither means was of much avail, and the stock of goods piled up 

1 An advertisement of 1789 gives a list of the goods produced, but conveys noth- 
ing as to respective quantities of each: ‘fine, middling, and coarse, Broad, and 
narrow Cloths, Serges, Coating, Baizes, etc.”’ (Bagnall, p. 103). Some cloths, it is 
asserted, were sold for as much as five dollars a yard (Bishop, i, 418). 

2 See p. 65 above, note 1. 

3’ Henry Wansey speaks of a storekeeper, Elisha Colt, who was interested in the 
enterprise, as having twenty or thirty pieces on hand. The latter, he says, sold the 
cloths, although of inferior quality, ‘‘at about the same price, I found, as our Eng- 


lish goods when delivered into the stores there’’ (Bagnall, p. 107). A quantity of 
goods was sent to Nathaniel Hazard, a merchant of New York, in 1789 (ibid., 


p. Ior). 





EARLY ATTEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION 69 


in the storehouse. Various schemes were employed to get rid of 
it: the prizes of the lottery granted by the state, it seems, were 
paid in cloth; auctions — to be sure, not an unusual method of 
sale with respect to imported goods — were resorted to in 1792 
and 1793, the first to get ready money; and finally in 1794 the 
one and only dividend ever paid by the company was announced, 
a 50 per cent dividend on the original shares, paid in cloth! And 
even then there were one hundred and forty pieces of finished 
goods on hand when the business was sold. 

The end came in 1795, after seven years of trials, when the 
equipment was put on the auction-block. It was purchased, per- 
haps bought in, by Colonel Wadsworth, one of the original pro- 
moters, who carried on the business for a couple of years, and 
then closed down the whole factory. 

After the Hartford attempt, only three others, all located in 
Massachusetts, require attention in the present connection: 
‘factories’ established at Stockbridge in 1789, one at Water- 
’ town in 1790,! and a third at Ipswich two years later. Of these, 
information is available only with respect to the last. This con- 
cern, called the “‘ Massachusetts Woollen Manufactory,” was pro- 
moted by John Manning, a physician; received encouragement 
from the state and town; and for a few years (until it was con- 
verted to the working of cotton) produced broadcloths, blankets, 
and flannels. The establishment was not so well organized as 
that at Hartford. The carding, spinning, and weaving were all 
done by hand, and in part perhaps at the homes of the workers. 
The manufacture of wool fabrics under such disadvantages was 
probably bound to be unsuccessful.” 

Such, then, was the history of the first endeavors to bring the 
wool manufacture from the home or workshop and organize it 
on a more extensive basis. It is a history of failures, but to the 
investigator the reasons for the failures, as far as one can ascer- 
tain them, are particularly instructive. It was quite clear that 


1 Bishop, i, 420. 

2 Bagnall, pp. 195-196. This venture was noteworthy in at least one respect: 
when Dr. Manning began the manufacture, he proposed to utilize the power of the 
wind, — possibly, as Bagnall says, a unique case in textile history. 


70 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


American woolens of the qualities that could then be turned out, 
could not hope to compete with imported goods. ‘Timothy 
Dwight expressed this view in 1796: ‘‘While population is so 
thin, and labour so high, as in this country, there is reason to fear 
that extensive manufactories (of woolens) will rarely be profit- 
able.”? 1 The failure of a company, such as the Hartford enter- 
prise, to sell its products was but the natural result of existing 
conditions. Chief among these unfavorable circumstances were 
the narrowness and peculiar character of the domestic market, 
which, being limited largely to the towns and to the superior 
grades of fabrics, not only made the competition of British goods 
especially severe, but called for a higher quality of domestic 
product than the conditions of wool supply, technical equip- 
ment, and manufacturing skill in the American industry rend- 
ered possible.2, But remedies were not beyond hope. Dwight 
himself recognized that important gains might be derived “‘from 
the several kinds of machinery by which labour is abridged.” 
Furthermore, a widening of the American market, the acquisi- 
tion of a better and more dependable wool supply, and the ac- 
cumulation of experience in the art of wooi manufacture would 
add important stimulus and strength to the infant industry. 

Already its chief rival, the British industry, had secured the 
advantage upon all these points. To the large British wool pro- 
duction was added the Spanish and other Continental stocks, the 
purchase of which was the readier by virtue of the world-wide 
demand for England’s manufactures. Then, British genius had 
contributed various “‘labor-abridging”’ inventions, notably a good 
carding machine and the spinning jenny. These had not been 
universally adopted in England, but in the growing Yorkshire 

1 Travels, i, 443. 

2 Better trained operatives and more competent supervision would both be 
needed in the effective operation of the domestic industry, particularly with 
respect to these goods of higher quality where the element of “ finish,” always 
difficult to impart properly, played an important réle. A lesser, and not wholly 
independent factor, is that of capital. This appears, for example, in the fact that 
the Hartford mill purchased at least some foreign wool because it could get it on 
credit instead of the local staple for which cash was needed (Clark, p. 366). How- 


ever, presumably an effective and otherwise successful manufacture would have 
attracted or accumulated capital. 





EARLY ATTEMPTS AT FACTORY PRODUCTION 71 


manufacture, where they could be utilized without change in the 
prevailing form of the production, — that of independent cloth- 
ler, — they had given additional competitive power. Finally, 
the century-old practice in wool-working had given the British 
manufacture a skill in the fabrication of cloths which, in conse- 
quence of the localization of the industry, the permanence of the 
population, and the stable occupational habits of the people, was 
passed on from generation to generation of wool workers. 

Surprisingly enough, the American industry by approximately 
1830 had acquired a position not much, if at all, inferior in com- 
petitive strength to the British manufacture, at least in so far as 
the common run of fabrics is concerned. How was this change 
effected? By virtue of improvement in what factors? These are 
questions to which obviously no ready answer may be given. 
Some attempt at reply, however, will be made in the succeeding 
chapters. 


CHAPTER V 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY 


Tue changes in the character of the raw material supply are of 
an outstanding importance when considering the development 
of the American wool-manufacturing industry. A detailed in- 
quiry into the history of wool-growing within the United States, 
to be sure, would be out of place here,’ but sufficient discussion 
must be brought within this survey to show the interactions be- 
tween the two industries of wool-growing and wool-manufactur- 
ing,—the effect upon the wool-growing side of the needs or 
aspirations of the manufacturing end, and contrariwise the in- 
fluence of the supply of raw materials in encompassing and so to 
a degree determining indirectly the character of the wool-cloth 
production. Incidentally, one method will be indicated whereby 
a break was secured in the vicious circle which, it is suggested 
above, existed in colonial times between the quality of domestic 
wool clip and that of domestic wool manufacture.” 

The dependence of the wool manufacture upon the raw ma- 
terial, and the difficulties of successful fabric production for do- 
mestic markets without improvement of the local wool supply, 
were perceived by contemporary observers. The first circular 
sent out by the New York Society for the Promotion of Useful 
Arts contained the query: ‘‘Can you suggest any plan of im- 
proving our wool so as to render it more fit for superfine fab- 
rics?’’? and Hamilton in his celebrated Report suggested the 
high expediency of ‘‘raising and improving the breed: of sheep 
at home” as “the most efficacious aid”’ to the manufacturing 


1 See Wright, Wool-Growing and the Tariff, pp. 12-16, 22-31, which will form the 
basis of this review, although Randall’s Fine Wool Sheep Husbandry, and the Special 
Report on the Sheep Industry (Carman), 1892, also contain accounts of the 
period. 

* See above, p. 56. 


72 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY 73 


industry.! .To these ends efforts had been made long before the 
first considerable importations of improved breeds actually oc- 
curred. These efforts exemplify particularly that patriotic move- 
ment for self-sufficient cloth production to which some reference 
has already been made.” Indeed, the events of the period prior 
to the Embargo of 1807 that are concerned with betterment of 
the domestic wool supply are, I believe, to be interpreted as the 
expressions of that spirit, rather than as the result of the action 
of economic forces. As early as 1785 the South Carolina Agri- 
cultural Society offered a premium for the first full-blooded 
merino — the highly improved Spanish breed — that was in- 
troduced into the state, and Massachusetts soon did likewise.? 
Again, the New York Society already mentioned caused ‘‘In- 
structions” to be printed for the attention of captains of 
vessels sailing to foreign lands. These instructions, which were 
“to be stuck up in their respective cabbins,” made special 


1 Transactions of this Society, i, xiv; Taussig, State Papers on the Tariff, p. 99. 
The Hartford company also urged an improvement in sheep breeding (North, 
Bulletin, 1899, p. 141). 

2 See above, pp. 61-64. Other evidences of this spirit are numerous. In the 
period of the Confederation, several of the States, e. g., Massachusetts, Rhode Is- 
land, and Pennsylvania, had enacted tariffs of a protectionist trend and, in the first 
case, avowedly for protection (Hill, First Stages of the Tariff Policy, pp. 75-90; 
Giesecke, American Commercial Legislation before 1789, pp. 131-134). The Massa- 
chusetts General Court appointed a joint committee ‘‘to view any new invented 
machines that are making within this commonwealth, for the purpose of manu- 
facturing sheep’s and cotton wool, and report what measures are proper for the 
legislature to take to encourage the same” (Taft, Some Notes on the Introduction of 
the Woolen Manufacture into the United States, p. 3; hereafter referred to as Taft, 
Notes). Connecticut exempted all woolen factories from taxation for a period of 
years, and their workers from the poll tax (Bagnall, p. 100). Finally, voluntary 
associations for the furtherance of domestic manufactures were organized, in Phila- 
delphia in 1787, which revived the short-lived “Company” of 1775, in Germantown 
in 1790 (Scharf and Westcott, op. cit., ili, 2314), and in New York in 1791, the one 
whose Transactions have already been quoted. 

8 Wright, p. 11; Bulletin of the National Association of Wool Manufacturers 
(hereafter referred to as Bulletin), 1905, p. 224. 

The Spanish merino, it may be noted, was a breed improved by the Moors during 
their occupation of Spain, and preserved by their subsequent conquerors. In the 
latter part of the eighteenth century the exportation of these animals was pro- 
hibited, in an endeavor of Spain to maintain a monopoly of this superior sheep. 
Hence the special efforts on the part of the American societies to secure specimens. 


74 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


note of sheep: ‘“‘particularly if you should be able to obtain the 
sheep of Spain or Barbary, which are amongst the most valu- 
able, even though they should not appear to you superior to 
those of this country.”! Thus the spirit of improvement was 
abroad. 

The earlier importations of the much coveted merino bear out 
this contention of zealous patriotism. The first sheep to arrive 
— barring two which were sent in 1793 to Cambridge, Massachu- 
setts, and which the owner, in his ignorance of their value, “sim- 
ply ate up’”’ ?— was the full-blooded ram Don Pedro, brought 
over by Messrs. Du Pont de Nemours and Delessert in 18o0r. 
Their purpose seems to have been altruistic, both negatively, in 
that they were not as yet interested in the wool manufacture, and 
positively, in that they soon afterwards offered gratis to neigh- 
boring farmers the use of this animal for stud purposes.* ‘The 
next groups to come were those which in the following year were 
brought in by Robert Livingston and David Humphreys, men 
who undoubtedly were moved by whole-hearted desire to serve 
the country. The former had been active in the New York So- 
clety above referred to, and later, as he writes in his Essay on 
Sheep, his ambition had led him to render himself yet “more ex- 
tensively useful, by suggesting and enforcing such improvements 
in agriculture as might add to the wealth of individuals, and, by 
forming the basis of manufactures, to the independence of our 
country.” * Humphreys gave a similar explanation of his interest 
in this project: in brief, that he was ‘‘convinced that this race 
of sheep . . . might be introduced with great benefit to our 
country.”’® By their efforts, the former was able to secure two 


1 Transactions of the New York Society, i, 96. The latter clause was evoked be- 
cause of the fact that in improving the fleece of the merino the carcass had been 
sacrificed to a degree. They were, and still are, small animals as compared, for 
example, with the English ‘‘mutton” breeds, where in the main the object of the 
improvement had been in the opposite direction. 

* Randall, p. 30. 

3 Bishop, ii, 87. 

4 Essay on Sheep, 1809 ed., p. 6. 

5 Letter (on importation of sheep) for which he was given a gold medal by the 
Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture; reproduced in Bulletin, 1905, 
Pp. 245. 


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IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY 70 


pair from the French flock at Rambouillet, a flock originated by 
gifts of sheep from the Spanish to the French king; while the 
latter made the first large importation, twenty-one rams and 
seventy-five ewes, bringing them direct from Spain after Eng- 
lish invasion of that country had made exportation possible.! 
These were the main arrivals before the Embargo was imposed, 
although two or three additional pair actually entered, the pur- 
pose of whose owners is not clear. 

Immediate reformation of the American wool supply was, how- 
ever, by no means forthcoming. For example, Livingston, re- 
turning in 1805 to the United States after a protracted stay 
abroad, was chagrined to find that the efforts of Du Pont, Hum- 
phreys, and himself had brought so little result.2, But the ob- 
stacles were various: beside the normal conservatism of the 
farmer, there was a further dislike for these sheep in particular 
by reason of their small size and of the poor quality of their flesh 
for food; while, above all, the economic motive was lacking, ‘‘a 
vital impulse,’’ as Humphreys phrased it. There had first to be 
a demand for the finer wool from a growing wool manufacture so 
situated as to be able to supply the domestic market for the finer 
fabrics. An inkling of this necessity may have come to these 
early propagandists of the merino breeds, since Humphreys in 
1806, followed by Livingston and Du Pont, began the manufac- 
ture of fine woolen cloths.* The superiority of this new wool, to 
be sure, may have been appreciated and sometimes employed by 
the small-scale manufacturers of those early years,—of whom 
something will be said later. But it took the suddenly opened 
opportunity created by the Embargo and Non-Intercourse laws, 
particularly the reduction of competition in the domestic woolen- 
goods market, to bring forth a strong economic motive or 
‘‘vital impulse” for the use of fine wool. 

The movement of prices for merino wool during these troubled 
years of commercial hostilities reflects the altered condition of 
demand. During 1807 wool of this quality rose to a dollar a 
pound.* By 1809 it was stated to be double that amount, while 


1 Wright, pp. 14-15. 3 Randall, Fine Wool Sheep Husbandry, p. 44. 
2 Ibid., p. 15. 4 [bid., p. 45. 


76 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


the value of the wool from the “‘good common sheep”’ was given 
as but fifty cents per pound.? In sympathy with this course of 
merino wool prices, the value of the animals began to soar. A 
‘‘merino mania’”’ set in, during which speculation ran riot and 
as much as a thousand and fifteen hundred dollars were given for 
full-blooded rams.” As yet, however, there did not exist a suff- 
ciently broad and firm demand for the finer staple to warrant 
such extreme prices for merino wool, or for the fine-wooled ani- 
mals. A collapse in prices was inevitable; but in part this col- 
lapse was brought about through an increase in the supply of 
merino sheep. William Jarvis, American Consul to Portugal, 
seized the opportunity offered by the current political convul- 
sions in Spain and by the lifting of the American embargo, to 
ship some four thousand sheep to the United States. The ship- 
ments were begun in 1810. The animals were distributed ‘‘to 
every state which (Jarvis thought) would be likely to profit by 
the acquisition,’ being sent to various ports from Wiscasset, 
Maine, to Norfolk, Virginia.* Other large importations followed, 
apparently now impelled by a commercial motive, until by the 
latter part of 1811, probably over twenty-five thousand merino 
sheep had been secured.* 

1 Livingston, Essay on Sheep, p. 141. 

2 Randall, Fine Wool Sheep Husbandry, p. 45; Westcott, History of Philadelphia, 
ch. 785; Capron, Bulletin, 1881, p. 128; Census of 1860, iii, p. xxix. 

Elkanah Watson, who was influential in spreading the culture of merino sheep, 
writes of the “‘astonishing inflation,” giving a personal experience: ‘‘I purchased a 
beautiful buck of the Chancellor (Livingston), at $175, for which I repeatedly re- 
fused one thousand dollars, and afterwards sold him for twelve dollars” (Memoirs, 
Pp. 343). Westcott (History of Philadelphia, ch. 785) quotes largely from a pamphlet 
of certain cautious writers who as early as 1810 inveighed against the speculation 
which was going on in merino sheep. The title of their publication was: ‘An Anti- 
dote to the Merino Mania now progressing through the United States, or the Value 
of the Merino Breed placed upon a Proper Basis. ‘Look before you leap.’”? The 
substance of their criticism was that merino wool was of no great value unless the 
wool-manufacturing industry proved capable of withstanding foreign competition. 

3 Benton and Barry, Statistical View, 1837, p. 130. 

4 Carman, pp. 193-197. The following is an interesting commentary on the 


whole movement: 
When first Merino’s bless’d our land 
Thro’ Humphrey’s patriotic hand, 
Methought I'd be a patriot too 
And buy a ram Merino true; 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY Fadi 


The acquisition of so considerable a number of pure-blooded 
merinos laid the basis for a substantial production of fine stapled 
wool, rendered more firm and beneficial by the general dispersion 
of these animals through the country. As a result of govern- 
mental assistance and of the formation of agricultural societies, 
hardly a section of the northern and middle states (and in- 
cluding Virginia) was unaffected, the tide reaching the West, 
Ohio and Kentucky, by 1810 and extending there with much 
rapidity.? 

Since the stimulation of interest in the merino sheep after about 
1807 was primarily the result of the altered conditions in the wool 
manufacture, the relation between the distribution of these ani- 
mals and the location of many early factories is significant, and 
is pertinent to the present discussion. For example, Du Pont, 
who had from the first fostered the establishment of the merino 
breed in Delaware and who was said in 1812 to have “‘perhaps 
the largest and best”’ flock of sheep in America, erected three 
wool-manufacturing plants himself. Apparently as a result of 
this and similar events, twenty-one farmers in the neighborhood 
of Wilmington were reported in 1814 to have over two-thirds full 
or grade merino among their 4300 sheep.2, The Harmony So- 
ciety in Pennsylvania raised merino sheep and established the 
manufacture of broadcloth. In Windham County, Connecticut, 
in Dutchess County and near Oriskany, New York, and around 


One hundred eagles was the price, 

I paid the shiners in a trice; 

I’ll risque my fame and fortune too, 

Quoth I, on what a ram can do. 

Scarce did my hobby ’gin to thrive, 

’Ere thousand Spanish rams arrive, 

And what I dream’d not of before, 

My ram turned out to be a bore. 
Quoted from the Hampshire Federalist, by American Watchman (Wilmington, Dela- 
ware), November 3, 1810. 

1 Wright, pp. 25-30; Goodwin, American Historical Review, xii, 770. The fur- 
ther history of the merino sheep in the United States cannot here be traced in de- 
tail. In general one may note, however, that not until the more recent decades has 
there been scarcity of fine wool in the country sufficient to affect materially the 
development of the wool manufacture. 

2 North, Bulletin, 1900, p. 41; Niles, i, 390. ‘‘Grade merino” is a term used to 
imply a mixture of merino blood and that of common or unimproved sheep. 

8 Bishop, ii, 105. 


78 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Steubenville, Ohio, wool improvement and factory development 
went hand in hand, the proprietors of the Steubenville factory 
themselves having a large flock.1. In Massachusetts, Derby of 
Salem, a prominent merchant-shipper, imported 1100 merinos 
in 1811 and two years later set up the manufacture of fine cloths.? 
Again, in Berkshire County, the early and sustained interest in 
the wool manufacture, supplemented by the activity of Elkanah 
Watson in introducing the improved sheep culture, created a 
marked correlation between the two industries, and in 1815, of 
the sheep owned within a mile of Pittsfield, approximately 8500 
in number, only 852 were of the common breed.? 

Attempts at improvement in quality of wool production, how- 
ever, were not exclusively concerned with the merino develop- 
ment. Other breeds of sheep, quite different from the merino, 
were also introduced into the United States during the early years 
of the century, — the long-wooled English varieties, which dur- 
ing the preceding century had been improved by Bakewell, the 
Culleys, and others in England. Of these Washington had one 
of the finest flocks in the country; and after his death and under 
the care of Mr. Custis, the Arlington long-wool sheep, which were 
partly of the Bakewell variety, became famous throughout the 
country.* Occasionally, too, sheep of the English breeds were 
smuggled into the country despite the British prohibition of ex- 


1 Larned, History of Windham County, i, 427; Bishop, ii, 195; Capron, Bulletin, 
1881, p. 127; Columbia Gazette (Utica, New York), May 28, 1811. 

2 Bishop, ii, 195. 

3 Pittsfield Sun, June 15, 1815. 

In other instances, manufacturers made a direct appeal to farmers to increase 
their fine-wool production. For example, the Housatonic Woolen Factory, located 
at Pittsfield, Massachusetts, offered to receive wool in payment of merino rams 
which the proprietors had for sale, and fixed prices for its receipt, ranging from $2 a 
pound for full-blood, $1 a pound for half-blood, to 50 cents for common wool (Piits- 
field Sun, date lost). In another case, a Wilmington (Delaware) concern offered 
merino rams at a low rental per season, agreeing to buy all the wool produced from 
crosses of these animals on common sheep at double the price of common wool, what- 
ever it might be, provided the farmer in turn agreed to turn over to them all his 
grade wool (American Watchman, July 28, 1813). Arthur W. Magill, the leading 
spirit in the Middletown (Connecticut) Woolen Factory advertised merino bucks 
to rent (Middlesex Gazette, September 12, 1811). 

4 Wright, p. 10; Livingston, Essay on Sheep, 1800, p. 147. 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY 79 


port,’ and sales thereof are sometimes reported.? Finally, Mease, 
writing in 1813, stated that though the Census of rSro had taken 
no account of the “‘invaluable new Leicester or Bakewell sheep,”’ 
they were spreading rapidly through the middle states, New 
Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York.? The introduction of such 
breeds, however, was not of immediate value to the wool manu- 
facture. While the wool was usable in coarse cloths and blankets, 
sometimes apparently ‘“‘chopped”’ to render it more easily work- 
able, it was best adapted to the worsted branch of the industry, 
which, as will shortly appear, had slight importance in the United 
States for many years. The animals, nevertheless, did probably 
prove of service for crossing purposes. ‘The breeding of a long- 
wool ram with a merino ewe gave issue which possessed some of 
the characteristics of each parent, a somewhat better carcass than 
the merino animal and somewhat finer wool than the English 
type. For this purpose, English breeds were much more valuable 
than the common sheep of the country. In subsequent years, 
furthermore, with the rise of the trade in mutton and the later 
development of the worsted manufacture, crossbred sheep of this 
sort, the typical ‘‘crossbreds”’ of this country, became of excep- 
tional utility. No variety of sheep has quite so well satisfied the 
requirements of the small sheepman on the one hand — he has 
usually been a farmer carrying a small flock incidentally to 
arable cultivation — and the packer and wool manufacturer on 
the other hand. 

But concerning this whole matter of the introduction of new 
breeds of sheep, a word of caution is necessary. It is an aspect of 
wool production that may be too heavily stressed. The quality 
of the domestic wool supply was not immediately revolutionized 
by the introduction of the improved types. While during the 
first important period of factory development, in the ‘‘hot-house”’ 
period of embargo and war, the supply of fine wool played a par- 
ticularly important part in the domestic wool manufacture, such 


1 Pittsfield Sun, September 12, 1807; Bishop, ii, 119. 

2 Pittsfield Sun, August 28, 1809; January 24, 1810; Bishop, li, 136, 
note. 

3 Mease, Archives of Useful Knowledge, iii, 125. 


SO THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


wool really formed a very small part of the total domestic clip.? 
Moreover, with the collapse of the ‘“‘merino mania,” and with 
the post-war depression in the wool manufacture, which was es- 
pecially disastrous to the production of fine fabrics, the reaction 
against the merino breed was severe. Some of the fine-wooled 
sheep were slaughtered, various excellent flocks were scattered, 
and other flocks suffered from neglect. The spirit of improvement, 
to be sure, was not altogether dissipated. In 1818, the secretary 
of the Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture ventured 
to speak in favor of preserving the breed, though in tones of ab- 
ject apology: ‘‘Shall we dare to mention the merino sheep? . . . 
May we not take the liberty to plead the cause of this offending 
race of animals?”’? And gradually calmer counsels gained ground. 
The merino mania, it was said, had “had its day and injured 
many; but it is not likely that we shall have a return of it. We 
shall go on regularly.” ? Then, as the wool-manufacturing in- 
dustry improved in stability during the twenties, aided in part 
by the rising tariff duties, the conditions in the wool-growing end 
similarly became stabilized. Indeed, with that perversity which 
characterized the early history of our agriculture, another fine- 
wool mania soon set in; not in merino — that was impossible — 
but in the Saxony sheep. 

The Saxony was a sheep descended from the original Spanish 
merino. Animals of the latter breed were imported into Ger- 
many about 1765, coming largely as the gift to the Elector of 
Saxony from the King of Spain. There they were bred with 
special care. All efforts were directed to the attainment of the 
finest possible staple, although in the breeding to this end other 
qualities such as size, flesh, and reproductive powers suffered. 
The fleece, in consequence, averaged a pound or so less than the 
Spanish full-blood, but being of finer quality brought more in — 


1 Wright, p. 26. He also has given considerable space to the early movement of 
importations, and adds: ‘‘Greater attention is devoted to it (fine wool) because it 
was largely from this side that there came the first and most effective stimulus to 
improve the country’s flocks.”’ 

2 Massachusetts Agricultural Depository and Journal, v, 230-235; quoted in 
Wright, p. 61. 

$ Niles, xx, 85. 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY SI 


the market. Seeing only the latter, the farmers took up the 
novelty, although not carried away to the same degree as in 
the earlier merino movement. The increase in American wool 
manufacture, and especially the continued interest, almost ob- 
session, of the domestic manufacturer for the production of the 
finer fabrics, gave sufficient economic stimulus to the speculation.1 

The first importation, suggestively enough, is said to have been 
made by a manufacturer of fine woolens, Colonel James Shepherd, 
of Northampton, Massachusetts.? Introduction in volume began 
in 1824, and reached its height two years later, when some two 
thousand sheep were brought in. Sold initially at extravagant 
prices, but experiencing a considerable fall in value after the in- 
creased acquisitions, they followed the course of their predecessors 
in favor. In this case, moreover, the advent of a commercial re- 
action in 1826 assisted in the decline. But the spread of this 
breed at best was not so rapid as had been that of the merinos, 
nor on account also of the fewer numbers was its influence so 
great.? Still the Saxony made a minor contribution to the im- 
provement of our wool. 

By 1830, the wool production of the country had, as regards 
quality, apparently settled down to an intermediate position. 
The finest grades of wool, full-blood merino, were not, it appears, 
produced on any large scale. Thus in examinations made in 
1829 around Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and in Dutchess County, 
New York, to locate wool suitable for the finest of fabrics, — 
“‘pick-lock wool,’ — only one pound in seven hundred, and 


1 John L. Hayes, the leading spirit and first secretary of the National Associa- 
tion of Wool Manufacturers, gave the following account of the introduction of the 
Saxony sheep: “In 1824 a new impulse was given to our wool-manufacture through 
legislative influences. Factories on a large scaJe were established for making broad- 
cloths. The fashion of the times required cloths of great firmness, such as were 
made in England and France from wools of German Electoral sheep-husbandry, 
which was then at the height of its prosperity. The necessities of the broadcloth- 
manufacture required a finer wool than was supplied by the Spanish Merinos, as 
they then were commonly called. Saxon, or electoral Merinos were imported in 
large numbers” (Report on Group IX at International Exhibition of 1876, v, 29). 

2 Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society, i, 313. 

8 Importations during the first five years of the movement have been estimated 
at about 3300 animals (Randall, Fine Wool Sheep Husbandry, pp. 52-54). 


82 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


one in two hundred, respectively, were found.! Imports of 
wool indicate the same situation: there were substantial pur- 
chases of the staple from the fine-wool countries such as Spain 
and Germany.” Again, the bulk of the domestic wool produc- 
tion still consisted of the fleeces from the so-called common sheep, 
especially in the regions unaffected by the rising factory sys- 
tem. The fleece of such sheep served well enough in household 
manufacture. But the introduction of the merino and Saxony 
sheep had not been without effect. In certain sections of the 
country, notably Washington County, New York, Vermont in 
general, West Virginia, and around Steubenville, Ohio, flocks of 
superior grade are known to have existed.2 There, and probably 
elsewhere, the sheep were presumably of blooded quality, i. e., 
the common breed improved by a mixture of the pure blood from 
the imported stock. The wool manufacturers, moreover, follow- 
ing the early precedents, frequently kept their own flocks. Dick- 
inson, the Steubenville proprietor, had the largest: he owned 
three or four thousand sheep himself, and his partner as many 
more.* Unquestionably, then, wool production by 1830 had made 
an important advance over the conditions of the colonial period 
or those in 1800. No longer was the wool manufacture heavily 
handicapped, as in the days of the Hartford “‘adventure,” by the 
lack of fairly satisfactory raw material. From the fine and 
“grade”? domestic flocks, supplemented by importations, the 
manufacturer was able to secure a stock of wool which did not 
compare hopelessly with the supplies available to foreign pro- 
ducers. 

The further outstanding feature of the wool-growing industry 
during this period, the transference from what might be called a 


1 Niles, xxxvii, 97. This test was probably for full-blooded merino or Saxony 
wool. 

2 Wright, pp. 67-72. There was also an importation of coarse wool, from Turkey, 
South America, and elsewhere, which did not compete with even the common wool 
of this country, and which found employment in the production of negro cloth, 
coarse blankets, carpets, and the like. 

3 Wright, pp. 70-71. Washington and Lawrence counties in Pennsylvania 
might also be mentioned. 

4 State Papers, Finance, 1828, v, 794, 796, 797, 798, 799, 801 (Dickinson), 806. 
Also, Lippincott, Manufactures in the Ohio Valley, p. 93. 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY 83 


casual to a commercial basis, is of special interest in this study 
by reason of the development of marketing agencies intermedi- 
ary between grower and manufacturer. Previously, it seems, 
the trade had been wholly unorganized, depending upon the 
personal contact of the two parties. The Hartford factory had 
apparently felt itself restricted to local wool supplies, in so far as 
foreign wool was not attainable; and, in the Byfield establish- 
ment of 1793,—to be described shortly,— John Scholfield went 
about the country buying wool.! With the higher development of 
the wool manufacture, there was the beginning of a new era, al- 
though, to be sure, the earlier system, or lack of system, did not 
wholly pass away for many years. The country storekeepers, 
who in the colonial period had traded somewhat in wool, now 
seemingly expanded their operations; and sometimes men in 
other lines took up the business as an incidental source of gain, — 
as, for example, Taylor & Peck of Pittsfield sometime before 1812, 
men who were primarily cabinet-makers.? Then still other agen- 
cies arose. The various Societies for the Encouragement of Do- 
mestic Manufactures seem to have done some dealing in wool as 
well as in the finished goods.* And soon thereafter, as we shall 
see to have been the development in the case of cloth marketing, 
strictly commercial establishments soon followed in the footsteps 
of these patriotic institutions. For instance, a wool warehouse 
was set up in Boston by 1814. Here advances were made on wool 
deposited and sales were made on commission.* Other such inter- 
mediaries undoubtedly sprang up, trading wholly or principally 
in this material. The increased domestic commerce in wool is 
evidence of this development. Niles reported in 1825 that “‘ wool 
in large quantities is now brought from the west,” since it bore 

1 Clark, p. 366; Taft, Notes, p. 15. 

2 Piiisfield Sun, June 13, 1812. 

3 E. g., Philadelphia Society, Bishop, i, 118. 

These societies were founded: Massachusetts, 1792; New York, 1798; Phila- 
delphia, 1805; and Baltimore, 1809. 

4 Massachusetts Spy, July 20, 1814. The advertisement continues: ‘To the 
manufacturer of Wool, and the proprietor of flocks, the advantage of this establish- 
ment will be manifest. .. . To the purchaser . . . the most favorable selections, and 


to the seller . . . the ready sale for his fleeces, on as good terms as the market will 
afford.” 


84. THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


the cost of transportation better than most other commodities 
that could be produced beyond the mountains. In 1828 the 
proprietors of the Steubenville (Ohio) factory were collecting 
wool from the surrounding country for shipment east, and an- 
other house of the same place was said to have sent to Boston 
150,000 pounds in a single year.?, Massachusetts, the rising wool- 
manufacturing state, was estimated at the time to grow not over 
a third of its requirements, and generally the manufacturers who — 
testified in the inquiry of 1828, with the exception of those in 
New York, spoke of the deficiency of local supplies.* —The woolen 
mill still dealt largely with the individual farmers in the sur- 
rounding country, sometimes offering cloth in exchange for wool; 
but a distinct organization for the marketing of wool was surely 
growing. 

Of less general import to the present discussion than the factors 
of quality in production and methods of marketing is that of 
quantity in the annual wool clip. It happens, too, that the 
changes in quantity of domestic wool production were less strik- 
ing during the period under review than were the changes in those 
other aspects. The annual clip increased considerably, of course, 
between 1760 and 1830, although one cannot even estimate by 
what measure. We know only that between 1810 and 1830 the 
increase was something like 100 per cent.* But such an enlarge- 
ment of the national production one would expect, with the 
advance in population and with the enhancement in domestic 
prosperity. It is probable, too, that whether the factory had 
come or not, an increase of not dissimilar proportions might well 
have occurred. The factory in considerable degree merely seized 

1 Niles, xxix, 166. 

2 State Papers, Finance, v, 801; Niles, xxxili, 155. 

3 State Papers, Finance, v, 794, 796, 799, 805, 807. Exceptions in New York, 
ibid., pp. 793, 797, 802. Sundry considerable sales of domestic wool in eastern 
centers are spoken of by Niles. For example (xviii, 464), a wagon, drawn by seven 
horses and containing three tons of wool, was passed on its way from New Hamp- 
shire to Danvers, Massachusetts. See also Niles, xxx, 20; xxxii, 359; State Papers, 
Finance, v, 805. 

4 Wright, pp. 27, 75. 


In the decades just prior to 1830 there was also a substantial increase in the 
volume of raw-wool imports (Wright, pp. 30, note, and 65-73). 


IMPROVEMENT OF THE WOOL SUPPLY 85 


upon sections of the domestic wool-cloth market which had hereto- 
fore been dominated by the household production, or which, 
barring the existence of the factory, would have fallen under the 
sway of the household system. 

In summary, then, it may be said that, by 1830, the domestic 
wool supply, which had grown with somewhat the same pace as 
that of the country’s expansion, had received an appreciable im- 
provement in quality through the introduction of foreign breeds 
of sheep and their important though faltering culture. By this 
means and by the growth of a larger wool-import trade, the wool 
manufacture had been freed from dependence upon the unim- 
proved staple of the common-wool sheep, so distinctly inferior 
to the raw materials available to foreign wool-manufacturing 
industries. Likewise, there had been a beginning of country- 
wide dealings in wool through an organization of increasing viril- 
ity, which in diverse ways promised additional strength to the 
manufacturing end of the industry. Not only did these improved 
facilities proffer a wider choice of, staple to the manufacturing 
enterprise, but they came to relieve it of a considerable financial 
burden ! and particularly of the duty, arduous to an industrial 
concern, of searching out its raw material.” 

1 Bond (Report on Wool and Manufactures of Wool, 1887, p. lviii), gives an account; 
probably exaggerated, of the frequent mortgaging of mills and machinery in the re- 
covery of the wool manufacture after 1829, in order to procure wool. But undoubt- 
edly the investment of capital in the year’s supply of raw material was much heavier 
under the old than under the rising system. 

2 The above account of the evolution of wool dealing in this country puts the 
beginnings somewhat earlier than does Wright, who, following Bond (op. cit.), 
states that “the buying and selling of wool did not become a distinct branch of 
trade until about 1830,” and that “up to 1825, or thereabouts, manufacturers 
bought most of their wool direct from the farmers” (Wright, p. 74). However, 
Shaw, in his Wool Trade of the United States (p. 29), puts the “birth”’ of the inde- 


pendent trade in the decade of the twenties; and the evidence appears to point to a 
commencement really somewhat earlier still. 


CHAPTER VI 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 


Two outstanding facts impress the investigator who dips into the 
technological history of the wool manufacture during the period 
ending approximately 1830: first, that starting with an assort- 
ment of apparatus composed chiefly of hand tools (barring the 
old fulling mill), the industry had by the end of that time acquired 
a technical equipment nearly all of which was in the modern form; 
and secondly, that this period marks the heyday of American 
invention with respect to machines for this industry.1 The Hart- 
ford factory, it will be recalled, possessed at the conclusion of its 
brief career only carding machines, small in diameter and of un- 
satisfactory performance; one spinning jenny, a hand-operated 
mechanism of unknown value; hand looms, and probably hand 
tools for the finishing operations, except the fulling. Probably, 
also, the greater part of the yarn preparation, including both 
carding and spinning, was done in the households of the surround- 
ing country throughout the unhappy life of this enterprise. 
Within forty years, improvements, chiefly of American origin, 
had given a new significance to the power-driven carding machine 
borrowed from England; had made the spinning operation quasi- 
automatic by a development unknown abroad; had harnessed 
the loom to power, for the most part independently of foreign 
advance; and had largely removed hand processes from the 
cloth-finishing operations through the invention of machines so 
valuable that they were frequently copied by other nations in 
subsequent years. This portion of our history, then, deserves 
particular attention; and perhaps more than in other periods of 


1 These statements are really limited to the woolen branch of the industry. 
This was practically the only section of wool-cloth manufacture carried on in the 
country at about 1830, the worsted branch being of negligible proportions. 


86 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 87 


our discussion it necessitates a considerable amount of comparison 
with developments in foreign countries.! 


1. The Carding Machine. 


The power-driven carding machine, which came ultimately to 
replace the hand cards of the old household system, was wholly 
an English development. Contributions to it covered particu- 
larly the period from 1748 to approximately 1790, and among the 
names of inventors who deserve special note are Daniel Bourne, 
Richard Arkwright, and James Hargreaves.? As these names 
suggest to the student of the Industrial Revolution, the machine 
was originally intended for the cotton industry, where indeed a 
sort of carding machine has always since then been used; but 
some time elapsed before it was adapted to the wool manufac- 
ture.* It was not until the last decade in the eighteenth century 
that this machine was coming into anywhere near general use in 
the British wool-manufacturing industry.* 


1 It is impracticable, and probably would be unprofitable, to attempt examina- 
tion into the source of every machine used in the wool manufacture. I have ac- 
cordingly restricted attention almost entirely to machinery involved in the chief 
processes — carding, spinning, weaving, and finishing. (For a description of 
modern wool-manufacturing processes, see Appendix C.) 

A minor feature would be that of pickers or willows, machines for opening up the 
matted locks of wool as they come from the scouring process. It has been claimed 
(Clark, p. 422) that these were New England inventions; but as early as 1806 
Arthur Scholfield was building pickers at Pittsfield (Taft, Notes, p. 29); a similar 
machine called a “‘twilly” is stated to have been “‘in general use”’ in the West of 
England in 1810, having replaced an early apparatus called a “devil” (Philadelphia 
Aurora, September 7, 1810); and a machine for opening, tended by a boy and doing 
the work of forty persons, is said to have been exhibited at the French Exposition 
of 1806 (Alcan’s Traité du Travail des Laines, reviewed in Bulletin, 1870-1871, 
p. 415). See also Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce, p. 650. 

2 Bramwell, The Wool-Carders’ Vade Mecum, pp. 132-135, 376-380, gives as full 
an account as any of this development. Arkwright’s and Hargreaves’ contribu- 
tions were the idea of workers and strippers and the doffer comb for the former, and 
the “fancy” for the latter. However, John Lees claimed that he invented the feed 
for cards which Arkwright used, and Hargreaves insisted that he originated the 
idea of the doffer comb covered by Arkwright’s patent (p. 378). 

3 Probably the same, or nearly the same, machine was at first employed in both 
industries, though subsequent developments have carried the machines for the 
two manufactures quite widely apart in structure. 

4 Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce, pp. 650-651. 


88 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Its introduction into the United States has been particularly 
associated with the family of Scholfield.t In March, 1793, John 
and Arthur Scholfield left their home in Saddleworth, Yorkshire, 
accompanied by John’s wife, his six children, and one John Shaw, 
a spinner and weaver, and sailed from Liverpool for America, 
landing in Boston a month or so later.2_ Upon arrival, the Schol- 
fields sought out Mr. Jedediah Morse, author of Morse’s Geog- 
raphy and Gazetteer and a man of some influence at the 
time, and introduced themselves as manufacturers well versed 
in the method of manufacturing woolen goods most approved 
in England. While awaiting Mr. Morse’s kindly efforts in 
their behalf, they located temporarily in Charlestown, and 
at once began the production of woolen goods, building for 
that purpose a spinning jenny of forty spindles and a hand 
loom, upon which, with the aid of Shaw, they manufactured 
black and mixed broadcloth. But this was mere ‘‘pot-boiling,”’ 
as it were. 

Through Mr. Morse’s good offices, the two brothers went later 
in 1793 to Newburyport, where they met people of influence who 
were inquisitive about the wool manufacture. For them the 
Scholfields built a carding machine, — the first specimen of the 
machine which the Scholfields were to be so influential in making 
an intimate part of the equipment in the American wool manu- 
facture. Though twenty-four inches broad,—as compared with 
the sixteen-inch machine of the Hartford adventure, —it had but 

1 Mr. Royal C. Taft, in his valuable contribution to textile history, Some 
Notes on the Introduction of the Woolen Manufacture into the United States, 
1882, has taken a special interest in tracing the experience of these men. I have 
used his account freely. 

2 The Census of 1860 (iii, p. xxix) stated that “Arthur Scholfield and other Eng- 
lish operatives .. . emigrated in company with Samuel Slater.” It is picturesque 
to think of these men who, with Arthur’s brother John, were to play such important 
parts in the history of American textiles, as coming over in the same bottom; but 
Mr. Taft has pricked the bubble. 

Incidentally it may be noted that the Scholfields and Shaws were or came to be 
common names in the Yorkshire woolen trade. Dodd (Textile Manufactures of 
Great Britain, 1851, p. 124) gives eleven Scholfields and eleven Shaws as inde- 
pendent manufacturers of woolen cloth in Saddleworth, the large number being 


due to the Yorkshire practice under the domestic system of each father bringing 
up his sons in the business. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 89 


a single cylinder, and appears a pygmy beside modern cards.1 
However, it was a machine of great potentialities. 

Having demonstrated the practicality of the machine by oper- 
ation in “‘Lord” Timothy Dexter’s barn, the Scholfields were 
engaged by a hastily organized company called the ‘‘ Newbury- 
Port Woolen Manufactory” to superintend the erection of ma- 
chinery and later the manufacture of woolen cloth in a mill which 
was constructed in the neighboring parish of Byfield.? In this 
plant they placed the original single-cylinder machine, and two 
double-cylinder machines which they had built in Newburyport 
after the approved pattern of the former; and the three machines 
were harnessed to water power. The factory presumably con- 
tained a full complement of woolen machinery, including prob- 
ably the spinning jenny and hand loom that the Scholfields had 
erected in Charlestown. Of these, only the carding and fulling 
machines were power-driven. 

But the enterprise, however improved its technical equipment 
over its predecessors, was not a success financially. Broadcloths 
and flannel are said to have been its chief products. These were 
to be sold at the store of the principal stockholder in the enter- 
prise, William Bartlett of Newburyport; but despite all efforts 
of the promoters the goods refused to move with sufficient rapid- 
ity. As early as 1795 a petition for aid was sent to the Massa- 
chusetts legislature, and repeated in 1797. A small revenue was 
derived from charging admission to the strangers who came out 
of curiosity to view the new phenomenon, a factory. Goods on 
hand were sold at ‘‘public vendue,” and funds were borrowed to 
pay the workmen. Struggling against such adversities, the busi- 
ness dragged on for a decade, until. in 1803 it was sold to an 
Englishman and converted into a cotton mill.’ 

The importance of the Scholfields, however, is not dependent 
upon the success or failure of a single industrial establishment. 

1 What is claimed to be the original machine, and presumably the real one, is 


preserved at the Davis & Furber Machine Company, North Andover, Massachu- 


setts. 

2 Among the stockholders was the eminent jurist, Theophilus Parsons. 

3 Davis (Essays in the Earlier History of Corporations, ii, 277) gives the best ac- 
count on the financial side. 


go THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Their more significant réle in the history of the American wool 
manufacture relates to the dissemination of the carding machine. 
The assertion has been made, it is true, that John and Arthur 
Scholfield were the very first to bring to the United States a card- 
ing machine of the improved model; but of this there is some 
doubt. One Samuel Mayall, for example, who was also an Eng- 
lishman, is said to have set up a carding machine on Bunker Hill 
sometime in 1788 or 1789, shortly after his arrival in Boston. 
The machine, it is narrated, was operated with horse power, and 
was one of two machines which Mayall succeeded in smuggling 
out of England. Later he went to Gray, Maine, where about 1791 
he conducted a shop for wool-carding and cloth-dressing, also 
manufacturing cloth on a small scale.2, Again, Phineas Bond as- 
serted in 1790 that ‘‘carding machines from the English models 
are in great use and well made in Massachusetts Bay and in other 
parts of New England,’’—a statement which must, it seems to 
me, refer to cotton cards, although Bond does not limit it so; 
while in Philadelphia a couple of years later (1793-1794) carding 
machines specifically mentioned as intended for wool-working are 
reported to have been constructed.* To be sure, the evidence con- 
cerning these cases is not so good as that of the Scholfield develop- 
ment, either upon exact dates or upon the true character of the 
machine; and possibly the Scholfields may be credited with the 
primary introduction of the improved carding apparatus. 

But the real claim of the Scholfield family to special recognition, 
it appears to me, rests on what seems a broader and more sub- 
stantial basis than primacy of introduction alone. The other 


1 Taft, Notes, p. 14. 

2 North, Bulletin, 1899, pp. 215-216. The source of North’s information was a 
letter from Mayall’s son written in 1889. 

There is mention of a machine earlier than the Hartford episode: see Bagnall, 
p. 238. This was probably an unimproved apparatus. 

3 American Historical Association Reports, 1896, i, 651. Cotton carding ma- 
chines were of different construction than the wool cards, although quite similar in 
function. They were introduced earlier than wool cards: see Bagnall, pp. 186, 272; 
Pennsylvania Magazine of History, viii, 378; Davis, Essays in the Earlier History of 
Corporations, i, 471. 

4 Essay on the Manufacturing Interest of the United States (1804), p. 27. As to 
Hartford machine, see above, p. 66. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT OI 


instances apparently were isolated affairs; the most that one can 
say of them is that they occurred; they did not affect the general 
course of the industry. Not so with the Scholfields. Like Slater, 
the father of the American cotton industry, the Scholfield family 
exercised a widespread influence, making up in their number 
what any single one of them lacked in signal business success as 
compared with the pioneer of the cotton manufacture. 

Dissemination by the Scholfields of knowledge concerning the 
improved carding machine was a result of the family’s dispersion 
through New England within a comparatively few years. Let 
us trace the course of these peregrinations. John Scholfield, in 
one of his wool-purchasing trips for the Byfield factory, became 
interested in a water-power site at Montville, Connecticut; and 
there the Scholfields went in 1799, after selling out their interest 
in the Byfield concern. In 1801 Arthur parted from his brother 
and moved to Pittsfield, Massachusetts; while John, after stay- 
ing in Montville until 1806, sold out and purchased a mill-site at 
Stonington, Connecticut.1 Subsequently (1814), John set up 
another plant at Waterford, near New London, which he placed 
in charge of hisson Thomas. Meanwhile, John’s oldest son, John 
Scholfield, Jr., after being in Colchester, Connecticut, for a time, 
in 1804 or 1805 set up a wool-carding shop in Jewett City, then 
a part of Preston, Connecticut. This business seems to have 
grown into a regular woolen mill, and by 1816 contained a full 
complement of machinery.?, Another son, Joseph, became in- 
terested in the Merino Woolen Factory at Dudley, Massachu- 
setts, In 1817. 

In yet another direction the influence of the family was felt. 
A third brother, James Scholfield, who had been called from 
England as soon as John and Arthur had made a place for them- 
selves, in 1802 bought a mill privilege and fulling mill at North 


1 Of this establishment we know the mechanical equipment: two double carding 
machines, twenty-four inches wide; two spinning jennies of forty and fifty spindles, 
respectively, and a billy or slubbing machine of thirty spindles; the spinning ma- 
chines being operated by hand. The weaving, curiously enough, was done outside, 
partly on account of Scholfield and partly of individuals who bought the yarn from 
him (Bagnall, p. 424). 

Bagnall, pp. 458-459. 


g2 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Andover, with the financial assistance of Arthur. Here for ten 
years he carded wool for customers, adding in time the manu- 
facture of broadcloth. For this purpose he used machinery, 
spinning jennies and looms, operated by hand, which he placed 
in his house. In 1812 he sold out this business, becoming there- 
after superintendent in Mr. Nathaniel Stevens’s mill, which 
was erected the following year. 

Finally, of yet greater influence, it seems,—though of course 
one cannot estimate the stimulus given by force of example in 
the cases above mentioned,— was the activity of Arthur Schol- 
field, who left his brother John in 1801 (apparently because the 
latter did not like Arthur’s newly wedded wife) and went to 
Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Upon his arrival, Mr. Scholfeld, 
joined soon by his nephew Isaac, also set up a carding machine 
and for a few years did carding for customers, until in 1804 he 
began the manufacture of broadcloth on a small scale. But his 
main contribution was in another line: the manufacture of card- 
ing machines. He seems to have built a few almost from the 
beginning of his residence in Pittsfield. The first advertisement 
of machines for sale appeared in the P2tisfield Sun of September 
12, 1803; and in the next year (May 14, 1804) he informed the 
public that besides having machines to sell, “‘ built under his im- 
mediate inspection,”’ he ‘“‘will give drafts and other instructions | 
to those who wish to build themselves.”’ The terms of these 
services are not stated; nor is the reason clear, although reading 
between the lines suggests the competition which was already 
developing. He gives warning against imposition “by unin- 
formed, speculating companies, who demand more than twice as 
much for their machines as they are really worth.” 1 However, 
by 1806 the demand for his products was so great that he sold out 


1 Apparently by imitating Scholfield’s machines, other men had set up the manu- 
facture of carding engines in nearby towns, notably Giles Tinker who in 1804 began 
their construction in North Adams (Spear, History of North Adams, p.91). Because 
of the competition of these men, and perhaps in part by virtue of economies effected 
as more machines were turned out, Scholfield reduced his prices. At first he is said 
to have charged $1300 or more. But in 1806 he advertised machines for $253 with- 
out the card-clothing (the leather studded with fine wire, which covers the card 
cylinders), or $400 with it (Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 169). 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 93 


his carding business and devoted himself solely to the manufac- 
ture of machines for sale.’ Then, and indeed in after years, no 
more frequent recommendation of a carding machine was made 
than that it came from Arthur Scholfield’s workshop, and evi- 
dently it was believed that none higher could be made.? 

As a result of Arthur’s efforts, or of those of his competitors 
who were inspired by his example, carding machines sprang up 
rapidly throughout this section of the country. Town after town 
secured a carding mill, or the addition of a carding machine to a 
fulling mill already established; and, before the lapse of a half- 
dozen years, Berkshire County was dotted with these shops.® 

Incidentally it may be noted that Arthur Scholfield’s activities 
were not confined to carding machines. In 1806 he was manu- 
facturing picking machines, — machines for loosening the matted 
locks of wool in preparation for carding, and used then in con- 
junction with the carding machine at the mill of the custom- 
carder; and by 1809 he was constructing spinning jennies.* 
Finally he was concerned with the manufacture of cloth during 
the embargo and war periods, for a time by himself, but in 1814 


1 Pittsfield Sun, March 24, 1806. 

Taft found no evidence bearing out the statement of Bishop (i, 421), which was 
taken from the Census of 1860 (iii, p. xlviii), that Mr. Scholfield was compelled to go 
to England once or twice to refresh his memory as to the construction of the card- 
ing machine; or moreover, that he “‘smuggled from England portions of the machine 
or models and plans, concealed in his bedding”’ (Bishop, ii, 87). In consideration of 
the events above outlined, the story is on the face of it unacceptable, unless it refers 
to trips for the purpose of securing English improvements later than 1793. 

2 Similarly, the warmest praise for a journeyman wool-carder was that he had 
learned the trade under Mr. Scholfield. 

In 1807, when the embargo seriously affected his business, at least for a time, he 
had twenty-two machines on his hands (Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 170). 

8 A partial list of carding shops in Berkshire County and neighboring towns, 
drawn from advertisements in the Pittsfield Sun, with the dates of their first estab- 
lishment, is as follows: 


1802 Hadley. 1805 Stockbridge. 
1803 North Amherst. Lee. 
1804 Lenox. Bethlehem. 
West Stockbridge. Great Barrington. 
1805 Lower Mills, Hadley. 1806 Tyringham. 
Williamstown. 1807 Cheshire. 


4 Taft, Notes, p. 29; Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 178. 


94 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


as next to the largest subscriber to the Pittsfield Woolen and 
Cotton Factory, launched in that year.! Like others he suffered 
from the revulsion and depression that followed the advent of 
peace, for a while went back to wool-carding, and later acted as 
superintendent in one of the surviving mills. He died in 1827, 
apparently little richer than when he came to Pittsfield a quarter 
of a century before.” 

The Spread of the Carding Machine. The diffusion of the card- 
ing machine through the country was not a symmetrical and 
orderly affair; and yet, though often the adoption of the machine 
seems to have occurred in a sporadic and unaccountable manner, 
there is at least a general movement outward from New England. 
On account of the rapid spread of the apparatus after the first 
years, it is possible to give individually only a few of the earlier 
appearances and leave largely to the imagination the further dis- 
semination. Beside the Scholfield activities and the machines 
already mentioned as possibly anticipating those of the Schol- 
fields, one was put in operation at Leominster, Massachusetts, in 
1800,’ and simultaneously another in Farmington, Maine; * while 
in the next year a third was set up in New Ipswich, New Hamp- 
shire, by one John Saunderson, a Scotchman.® At about the 
same time machines were erected in Manchester, Connecticut,® 
and in East Chelmsford, Massachusetts, —in the latter case by 
Moses Hale, father-in-law of Nathaniel Stevens who, in the com- 
ing decades, became a manufacturer of note and was the founder 

1 Bagnall, p. 265. 

2 John Scholfield had a somewhat greater success. At his death, in 1820, he left 
three mill properties apparently free from encumbrances (Taft, Notes, p. 20). 

3 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 21. Two Englishmen, Lees and Taylor, 
says Hayes, came to this country in 1794. Lees returned to England and bought 
carding machinery which was shipped to Boston as hardware, and which was put 
into operation in Byfield about 1796. Consequently, “‘it is possible that the Schol- 
fields may have been assisted by Lees and Taylor.”’ But there seems to me little to 
substantiate this idea. 

In 1800 Lees went to Leominster and set up wool-carding there. 

4 Butler, History of Farmington, p. 263. 

5 Gould, History of New Ipswich, p. 229. Bagnall (p. 478) thinks the machine 
first set up there was of Mr. Saunderson’s own construction, founded upon knowl- 


edge of such machines which Saunderson obtained in England. 
6 Bagnall, p. 229, who thinks it was probably one of the Scholfield model. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 95 


of a family of wool manufacturers.! Closely following these 
earliest establishments came a number in the space of a year or 
two: Vernon, Connecticut (about 1802); Worcester, Massachu- 
setts (1803); Poughkeepsie, New York (1803), by one George 
Booth who is said to have brought the machine from England; 
South Kingston, Rhode Island (1804); and Haverhill and West 
Cambridge, Massachusetts (1805).? Thereafter the movement ac- 
celerated rapidly. Five years later, the defective census of 1810 
gave the figure of 1776 carding mills in the whole United States; 3 
and Gallatin wrote in the same year that ‘‘in the Eastern and 
Middle States, carding machines worked by water are everywhere 
established, and they are rapidly extending southwardly and 
westwardly.” * Indeed, the latter movement began early. Cus- 
tom-carding was advertised in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1806, and 
in 1812 Jefferson spoke casually of carding machines in Virginia.® 
With the westward extension of settlement, the carding machine 
moved along and was always to be found in the newly opened 
regions. 

The Significance of the Carding Machine. The introduction of 
the improved carding machine was of first-rate importance to the 
American wool manufacture. It meant in the first place the ac- 
quisition by the American wool manufacture of a power-driven 
apparatus which would replace the old hand cards. The saving 
in time thus made was great,—indeed, the work of hours being 
reduced to that of minutes.® But other considerations give this 

1 North, Bulletin, 1899, p. 236. See also the cases in Berkshire County, Massa- 
chusetts; p. 93, above, note 3. 

2 Bagnall, p. 317; Taft, Notes, p. 37; Platt, “History of Poughkeepsie,” in Hzs- 
tory of Dutchess County (Hasbrouck, ed.), p. 236; Taft, pp. 39, 43; Bagnall, 
p. 306. 

3 State Papers, Finance, ii, 693. In 1820, over twelve hundred carding machines 
were reported for New York state alone (Journal of the Assembly of New York, 
45th Sess., Appendix A, p. 60; quoted in Tryon, Household Manufacture, 
p. 289). 

4 State Papers, Finance, ii, 427. See also Bradbury, “Travels,” in Thwaites’ 
Travels, v, 285. 

5 Documentary History of American Industrial Society, ii, 329; Jefferson, Writ- 
ings, ix, 362. See also Clark, p. 518. 

6 The only detailed figures that I have found are English. They show that 
whereas it took a man ninety-six hours to card seventy-five pounds of wool by hand, 


96 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


acquisition even larger importance. Whereas in the first at- 
tempts at factory production, the carding was perforce done in 
the families of the surrounding country, now this operation might 
be brought within the factory walls. This circumstance of itself 
would assure a more dependable and a better supply of ‘‘card- 
ings;”’ but the machine gave a much superior as well as a much 
heavier and more regular product. The function of the carding 
process, it will be recalled, is to open the matted and tangled locks 
of wool and to mix the fibers of various lengths into a thoroughly 
homogeneous mass.!. These purposes at best could be accom- 
plished but indifferently and inconstantly under the hand method. 


Even in the Hartford factory, which had the services of a crude . 


carding machine, the criticism was made by the English visitor, 
Wansey, that the wool was “‘not half worked.” ? Such failure in 
the primary manufacturing operation rendered inevitable an in- 
ferior product all along the line, uneven and faulty yarn, and 
cloth of uneven if not defective texture. By the manipulation of 
the wool in the improved carding machine, aided as it usually was 
by the new picking machine, the basis for effective operation in 
the subsequent processes was well founded. Much validity, then, 
attaches to Taft’s statement: that ‘‘as the introduction of the 
spinning frame has been recognized as the beginning of the history 
of cotton manufacture in this country, the introduction of the 
carding machine may also be regarded as the initial point, the 


a machine tended by a child (perhaps a youth) would work the same in fourteen 
hours (British Documents, 1840 (43), p. 439). Under the usual American system 
where women and children did the hand carding, and at irregular intervals, the 
time required by the old method would be substantially greater. 

1 Tn the carding process as first performed, i. e., prior to the introduction of in- 
termediate diagonal feeds or of the condenser (see below), another feature of the 
operation was the attempt at a considerable parallelization of the individual fibers 
in the wool. The woolen process smacked somewhat of the kindred worsted manner 
of manufacture. (For general discussion of this point by one who objected to 
the change in manner of woolen operation, see Vickerman, Woollen Spinning, pas- 
sim.) The introduction of the feeding devices just noted has tended to diminish 
the extent to which parallelization can be carried, though still in some degree 
the fibers must be laid parallel in order that a sufficiently strong yarn may be 
produced. The change, however, is notable and will be considered below (see 
PP- 353-356). 

2 See above, p. 66. 


a a 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT Q7 


first proper introduction of the woolen manufacture, or the fabri- 
cation by machinery.’’! 

The immediate effect flowing from the introduction of this 
machine was not, however, a strengthening of the factory system. 
The operation of carding by machine was not a difficult one to 
learn passably well; and the machine itself neither was expensive 
nor required an exceptional amount of power. Accordingly, pro- 
prietors of fulling mills could easily add this apparatus to their 
equipment, and others could set up small shops for the sole object 
of carding by power. The diffusion of the carding machine, 
which, as we have seen, did take place quickly, was indeed an- 
tagonistic to the development of the factory system. It imparted 
an added virility to the household production. Fach locality, 
except apparently the seaboard towns, now had its carding en- 
gine, adequate to fulfill its needs for wool-carding. This arduous 
process was withdrawn from the household, to be more effectively 
carried through in the shop of the custom carder; and, being thus 
assured of a superior finished product, the household manufacture 
of wool fabrics was enabled to compete to better advantage with 
the rising factory production.? Moreover, the expanding western 
settlements were given additional strength by means of which to 
render themselves self-sufficient and to resist the encroachments 
of the eastern mill products.’ 


1 Bulletin, 1896, p. 17. 

2 Incidentally the “household”? manufacture became less strictly deserving of 
that name than ever before. Now at both ends of the operation — wool-carding as 
well as cloth-finishing — outside, professional aid was accepted. 

3 An interesting description of custom wool-carding and its connection with the 
household manufacture, which I ran upon in the Orange County Gazelte (Goshen, 
New York), August 11, 1807, deserves to be recorded: 

- The season’s pass’d in which the Bear, 
Secluded lies from sun and air; 
He’ll now rejoice at Spring’s return, 
That he may feast on buds and fern. 
In some respects, I like the bear 
Have cause to wish the weather fair, 
That agriculture’s hardy sons 
May plunge their flocks in gliding runs; 
Well cleanse their fleeces, and prepare 
To fabricate their winter’s wear: 
Most cheerfully I take my stand, 
Before the public, heart and hand 


98 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Further Improvement of the Carding Machine. ‘The carding ma- 
chine as first introduced by the Scholfields and others was, judged 
by modern standards, a diminutive and relatively crude mechan- 
ism. While the larger cards of the present time attain a width 
of sixty or seventy-two inches, the original Scholfield machine was 
only twenty-four inches wide. The modern carding apparatus is 
among the heaviest of wool-working machinery; but the first 
Scholfield card could be moved about by two or three men. Both 
the frame and cylinders were made of wood, and the single- 
cylinder machine was not over five feet in total length. The con- 
struction out of wood was in itself a check on the width of the 
machine. We know that John Scholfield, Jr., had by 1816 a 
double-cylindered ‘‘breaker”’ (the first carding machine in a “‘set”’ 
of two or three), which was three feet wide;! but probably most 
of the early machines were of lesser width. The surfaces of main 
cylinders, workers, and strippers (the auxiliary, smaller cylinders 
which, in revolving, alternately take wool from and return it to 
the main cylinder) must be exactly parallel, lest the teeth of the 
card-clothing tear the wool or become so worn and broken as to 
give an imperfect working to the fibers. A single warped board 
was likely to do considerable damage. Evidently appreciating 


To let my gratitude be known, 

For all the favours they have shown, 

And with petition to appear 

For patronage another year, 

To whom I’ll manifest regard, 

While they supply me Wool to Card. 

In Deerpark Town’s my Fulling Mill, 

On that fine stream call’d Shawangunk hill; 

I have a well contriv’d machine 

To Card your Wool and Pick it clean; 

But send a little oil pray do, 

A quart to twenty pounds or so, 

The girls when they do come to spin it, 

I think will find a profit in it. 

Should you to Newburgh go, 

Or any other Town below, 

Bring on your wool, ere you go back 

It will be carded, roll’d and pack’d: 

While I for trouble, time and wear 

Of Mill, and money for repair, 

Will only ask for each pound Carding 

Eight Cents and thank you in the bargain. 
May, 1807. GrEorGE F. REEVE. 


1 Bagnall, p. 459. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 99 


this weakness in a wooden apparatus, carding-machine builders 
began rather early to experiment with iron frame and cylinders. 
Data on the exact course and rapidity of progress are not avail- 
able, but seemingly about 1820 machines began to be built 
wholly of iron.’ Probably within the next decade this practice 
became better established, though it was several decades there- 
after, indeed, not until the post-Civil-War period, before the 
employment of all-metal apparatus can be said to have been 
general or perhaps even common.” 

But the most notable improvement concerned the delivery end 
of the machine, where the wool, fully worked, was removed from 
the mechanism.* In the early cards, as the wool was stripped 
from the doffer cylinder by the doffer comb, it was passed be- 
tween a wooden roller and trough, sometimes called a ‘‘shell,”’ 
and by this means was converted into soft rolls or ‘‘cardings”’ 
about a half-inch in diameter and as long as the carding machine 
was wide. In the household manufacture the conversion of these 
“‘cardings”’ into yarn upon the spinning wheel could be easily 


1 An advertisement of a Worcester (Massachusetts) machine maker in 1822 sug- 
gests the novelty of the iron apparatus then. He informs the public that he “‘is now 
constructing carding machines entirely of iron, the cylinders of which, being, as 
might be supposed, the most difficult parts to be constructed, are cast in four 
parallel pieces in such a manner as to combine great strength with light weight, 
and so contrived as to present no obstacle to fixing on the cards as easily and as 
securely as can be done upon cylinders of wood.” (Worcester Spy, July 10, 1822.) 

2 One reason for the delay in wide adoption of the all-iron machines was the 
great endurance of the framework of this apparatus. Wooden cylinders might 
be replaced by metal ones, and many sets of card-clothing might be worn out, 
and yet the wooden frame still be in serviceable condition. 

8’ Two minor features of the development may be mentioned. First: the intro- 
duction of the finer merino wool necessitated a nicer adjustment of the machine, 
but apparently this difficulty persisted only a brief time (Livingston, Essay on 
Sheep, p. 154; Providence Gazette, August 24, 1811). Again, by 1830 the “‘set”’ of 
carding machines had come to be more or less standardized: three single or two 
double cards. Dwight’s description of the Humphreysville factory (Travels, iii, 
392) speaks of “‘a breaker and finisher;”’ John Scholfield, Jr., in 1816 had a ‘“‘double 
breaker’? and two “finishing” cards (Bagnall, p. 459). Cf. North, Bulletin, 1901, 
p. 277; and particularly Bulletin, 1869, p. 144. According to the latter authority, 
a “set” of carding apparatus around 1825 consisted ‘‘of three carding machines, 
called the first and second breaker, and the finisher.”’ (This ‘‘set’” should not be 
confused with the looser use of the same term, which included the spinning machin- 
ery appropriate for carding apparatus of a given type; cf. below, p. 112, note 2.) 


IOO . THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


carried through, —indeed, more easily than that of the old hand 
cardings. The only important difficulty arose in attaching the 
cardings end to end. This was accomplished by rubbing two ends 
together between the fingers, but in the operation an appreciable 
thickening of the strand at the point of attachment was likely 
to result. While the household spinner could make some allow- 
ance for these irregularities, in the rising factories such lack 
of uniformity was a source of much concern. 





aii Hi 
mmm a 
eA 


CAAA AAA 


LSE 









Fic. 1. Slubbing Billy (English Model) 


In the manufacturing system as first evolved, a machine inter- 
mediate between the carding engine and the spinning machine 
proper — jenny or jack — had been introduced quite early, a 
machine called a “billy” or more formally a roping-machine.? It 
was a sort of modified jenny, having a smaller number of spindles 


1 This representation of the billy lacks the feed-table spoken of below in 
the text (p. 107). 

2 The origin of this machine was probably British. The first mention of it in 
the United States is that a billy of thirty spindles had been set up by 1806 in John 
Scholfield’s mill at Stonington, Connecticut (Bagnall, p. 424). Whether the Schol- 
fields knew of it upon their first arrival or later received information about it, is 
problematical. However, whatever the source, by 1810 these machines had become 
quite well known and quite widespread, the defective census of that year reporting 
fifty-three; and thereafter they form one item in the normal equipment of a woolen 
mill, usually in the proportion of one billy to three spinning machines (jennies or 
other). Cf. Tomlinson, Encyclopedia of Useful Arts, ii, 1034. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT IOI 


and a less elaborate form.’ Its function was two-fold: upon it 
the cardings were joined together, and by means of it they were 
somewhat drawn out or elongated, and given a little twist. The 
bringing of the cardings from the carding engine and the splicing 
of them upon the feed-table of the billy —by rubbing and rolling 
them between the fingers—were done by children; and then the 
drafting and twisting proceeded under the direction of a man, 
who indeed had general charge over the whole operation.? Inas- 
much as here the joining of the cardings was done, as it were, in 
wholesale quantity, the irregularities of the resultant roving were 
likely to be greater than in the household system. Nor was there 
opportunity as in hand spinning to reduce these lumps in the sub- 
sequent processes. The spinning here was carried through, as has 
been suggested, on jennies or jacks, machines which spun many 
threads at one time, and of course the operation had to be per- 
formed with mechanical regularity. A yarn lumpy or weak in 
spots was, however, the inevitable result of this early factory 
method, with the corollary of a woven fabric uneven of texture. 
Moreover, since the factory generally aimed at a higher grade of 
product, the defect was the more annoying. To remedy this situ- 
ation, attack had of course to be made upon the carding process. 

Accordingly, many attempts were soon being made to reform 
this operation or to introduce more satisfactory mechanisms for 
use therein.®? An improvement was reported as early as 1810 
which, it seems, looked toward what was ultimately the solution: 
it was a “perpetual roller”? invented by Arthur W. Magill, the 

1 Sometimes a jenny was in the early days used in place of the billy. 

2 This was the most important, practically the only important place in the 
woolen mill where child labor was employed. Child work on this machine, how- 
ever, was made particularly severe by the fact that the man in charge of the billy 
often, perhaps usually, hired the children. There are stories of many hardships 
that arose through this system: brutality, irregularity of the work, and the like. 

8 Since the apparatus used abroad were similar to those employed in American 
mills, we find the same criticisms of the process and corresponding attempts at re- 
moving the faults. Thus in an account of the processes of wool manufacture as 
carried on in the West of England about 1810 (Philadelphia Aurora, September 7, 
1810), the author says: “‘The present mode of joining the (carding) rolls is very de- 
fective, the rolls being larger at the joinings than in other parts, and the thread can- 


not but be irregular. Many attempts have been made to remedy this defect and to 
save labor, hitherto without effect.” 


102 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


leading spirit in the Middletown (Connecticut) factory, and 
aimed, it would appear, at the entire elimination of the billy and 
the substitution of a mechanism for drawing the wool from the 
carding machine in a continuous strand.1. Apparently this at- 
tachment was not successful, but experiments along this line con- 
tinued. John Goulding, who finally found the solution of the 
problem, himself began experimenting in 1820; and his efforts 
were aided by inventions pertaining to special portions of the 
process. One such invention, covering the important ring doffers, 
he purchased from Ezekiel Hale of Haverhill, Massachusetts; ? 
and another for a method of winding the ropings upon the long 
bobbin from one Edward Winslow, who subsequently cooperated 
with Goulding in perfecting the new device.? Indeed, Goulding 
stated in the specifications of his patent, which he in fact received 
in 1826, “I do not claim the construction of the individual parts 
of the machinery used in the processes before described, but the 
combination and arrangement by which they are made to produce 
thread from wool, or other fibrous material, by a continuous 
operation.”’* The other inventors had contemplated the reten- 
tion of the billy, but Goulding added to their work by so adjust- 
ing the machinery as not only to produce the endless roll but 
to dispense with the billy and slubbing process altogether. His 
may not have been an originating mind, but he had the power to 
grasp the details and to combine them into a practicable mech- 
anism that went beyond the conceptions of his predecessors or 
collaborators.°® 


1 American Waichman (Wilmington, Delaware), September 19, 1810. Another 
patent which seems in the same line was that of Alanson Holmes, of Pomfret, New 
York (January 8, 1810), called ‘‘a machine for carding and spinning wool by one 
continuous operation.” 

2 Bramwell, The Wool-Carders’ Vade Mecum, p. 381. Another ring doffer was 
also bought up; see North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 250. . 

3 Bonney, Bulletin, 1898, p. 42. 

4 Bramwell, op. cit., p. 385. The patent is No. 5355, May 2, 1826. 

5 A bitter controversy as to the true inventor arose, resulting finally in the law- 
suit, Eben D. Jordan vs. Agawam Woolen Company, Circuit Court of the United 
States, Massachusetts District, Boston, 1866. Eben D. Jordan had purchased the 
renewed patent of Goulding, and sued the Agawam Company for a certain in- 
fringement. The latter set up as one of their defenses that Goulding was not the 


a 





JOHN GOULDING 


The inventor of condensing apparatus for the 
woolen carding process 








THE FINAL (FINISHER) SECTION OF A MODERN 
CARDING MACHINE 


Showing the ring doffer, an essential part of Goulding’s mechanism, 
and the modern rub-roller condensing apparatus 





ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 103 


Although Goulding made various alterations in the carding 
operation proper, the most important feature of his invention was 
the delivery of the wool from the finisher card. The old roller and 
“‘shell”’ were eliminated, and in their place a rather complicated 
mechanism was substituted. For the single doffer cylinder on the 
old machine were set up two cylinders, placed one above the 
other. The card wire on these was laid on in strips around 
the cylinders, with uncovered spaces in width equal to the strips 
themselves, and so arranged that the uncovered spaces on one 
cylinder corresponded with the strips of wire on the other. By 
this means the sheet of wool on the last carding cylinder might 
be seized upon by the strips of wire on the doffing cylinders and 
separated into two sets of narrow bands.! These numerous bands 
were then drawn off through revolving tubes, which gave them a 
certain roundness, and wound upon spools the width of the card- 
ing engine. These spools, in turn, could be taken to and mounted 
at the back of the spinning machines, where the roving or more 
properly roping — the products of the Goulding mechanism — 
could be directly converted into yarn. 

This “‘American card,” as Goulding’s device was sometimes 
called, has been characterized by Hayes as ‘‘the most important 
of all contributions to the card-wool industry of the world” dur- 
ing the nineteenth century; and by North as “almost as great 
an advance in wool manufacture as the spinning jenny itself.” ? 
Undoubtedly it supplied the most striking change in the methods 
originator but Edward Winslow. Justice Clifford ruled in favor of Jordan, thus 
supporting Goulding’s claim. (There are two volumes of testimony and exhibits; 
see also Brodix’s American and English Patent Cases, viii, 56-60.) 

See in opposition the contentions of Daniel Bonney, a man who had worked in 
the mill with Winslow and Goulding when the latter brought his experiments to 
fruition: Bulletin, 1898, pp. 42-43. 

An exact apportioning of credit is of course impossible after the century which 
has elapsed since the patent was granted. Indeed, it must have been difficult at 
the time of the Jordan-Agawam trial to secure adequate evidence. Wherefore, 
while many points in the matter remain doubtful in my own mind, I am constrained 
to follow the opinions of earlier investigators, such as Hayes and North: American 
Textile Machinery, pp. 47-48, and Bulletin, 1901, p. 260. 

1 To be exact, under Goulding’s plan each roving was kept separate through the 


operations of the finisher card; but later this practice was dispensed with. 
2 Bulletin, 1879, p. 43; and Bulletin, 1894, p. 329. 


104 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


of producing woolen fabrics after the first organization of proc- 
esses and complement of machinery for factory production had 
been developed; and the effect of this change upon the quality of 
the fabrics turned out was also of first importance. Subsequent 
improvements to Goulding’s apparatus, such as the substitution 
of rub-rollers for the revolving tubes, have of course been made; 
and the so-called tape-condenser, of Belgian origin, supplies an 
alternative and apparently better mode of securing roping 
directly from the carding machine; but these in no way mark 
an advance upon preexisting mechanisms comparable with that 
made by Goulding’s contribution itself. 

The changes effected by the Goulding apparatus were particu- 
larly significant upon two counts: first, the billy and the slubbing 
process were wholly eliminated and, secondly, a roping of much 
superior quality was obtainable. Following from these two fea- 
tures is a third rather obvious one, that production was substan- 
tially increased. And the savings directly attributable to the new 
development are in part self-evident. The cost of manufacture 
was lessened by the reduction of capital outlay, by the elimination 
of the labor previously occupied in the slubbing process, and by 
the more effective production.’ Again, there was a direct social 
gain through the material reduction in the number of children 
employed in the woolen industry. But the mechanism also had 
results upon other apparatus. An impetus was given to the 
widening of the carding machines themselves by reason of the fact 
that it was no longer necessary to handle such tenuous articles as 
the old ‘‘cardings.”’? The greater homogeneity of the roping 
likewise made it possible for the spinner to manage a larger num- 
ber of spindles on the spinning jack, since there was now less 

1 With respect to the reduction in capital outlay, it may be noted that billies 
cost about $2.50 per spindle in 1825. A thirty-spindle machine, then, would cost 
around $75, which was substantially greater than the price of the Goulding attach- 
ment. Then, too, the saving in mill space must be considered. 

* That the long cardings, being handled by children, might drag on the floor, 
was also a factor which checked the widening of the carding machine (Wheelock, 
quoted by North, Bulletin, 1902, p. 132). 

North further states that now forty-inch cards began to appear; and that also 


the number of revolutions made by the cylinders of the machine could be increased 
(North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 330). 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT IO5 


danger of frequent breakages. Previously the jacks had been 
limited to 120 spindles; now 200-spindle jacks began to appear.! 
Such improvements in carding and spinning meant an appreci- 
ably increased effectiveness of the industry. 

It is uncertain just how rapidly this new device was adopted 
in American mills. No complete and immediate scrapping of pre- 
existing mechanisms could be expected, of course. The manu- 
facturers would be inclined to wear out the old machines. More- 
over, there was some hesitation in the trade about adopting the 
new affair. Thus, the Slater Mills bought a roping billy, a ma- 
chine which would be useful only under the older methods, as late 
as 1828.2 But, seemingly, North’s statement was generally correct: 
that after about 1830 no new sets of cards were started on the 
previous system.? In the Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company, 
for example, an inventory of 1835 showed two condensers, 
although one of 1827 had showed none.* Moreover, machine- 
builders began to pay considerable attention to the new appa- 
ratus at about this period, a firm in Worcester, Massachusetts, 
for instance, reporting the manufacture of eighty-five condensers 
in 1832.2 A number of years, perhaps a decade, may have elapsed 
before the Goulding method was universal or indeed predomi- 
nant; but the beginnings of this change had already been made 
by the close of the period now under consideration. 

The influence of this invention, one may note, was not confined 
to the United States. Gradually, though after a considerable 
lapse of time, the Goulding card was adopted in foreign coun- 
tries. In 1834 a patent was granted in England to one Charles 
Wilson covering a device which was apparently Goulding’s ap- 
paratus.®6 However, a book published in 1845, which describes the 

1 North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 330. 

2 Records of S. Slater & Sons Company, of Webster, Massachusetts. 

3 North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 330. 

4 Records of the Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company, of Pittsfield, Massachu- 
setts. The records also indicate in 1835 the presence of four billies at that date. 

5 McLane’s Report, i, 575. 

6 Ure, Philosophy of Manufactures, 1835, p. 181. It is possible that Goulding 
received an English patent. North speaks of Goulding making a trip to England 


in 1825 where he “left his application for a British patent pending” (Bulletin, 1901, 
i 262). 


106 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


British method of wool manufacture at that time, explains in full 
the nature and operation of the slubbing billy, but makes no 
reference to the condenser method.! In the early fifties, for the 
first time, it was stated that ‘‘the operation of slubbing has been 
lately superseded in many (English) mills by a machine called 
the Condenser;”’? but even as late as 1859, Baines gives slubbing 
as a normal operation in an English woolen mill, although rec- 
ognizing that ‘‘by a new machine, called the Condenser, attached 
to the carding-machine,” this operation may be eliminated.® 
Apparently, then, twenty to twenty-five years elapsed before this 
particularly valuable apparatus found its way across to England. 
The introduction of this invention upon the Continent was 
apparently not so long delayed as in the case of England, although 
data upon the point are not abundant. It is stated that the first 
appearance in France was about 1834,* but there is evidence that 
the apparatus was not extensively employed for ten or fifteen 
years more.® In Germany the course was about the same. 


1 Dodd, Textile Manufactures of Great Britain, 1851, pp. Ioo-101. 

2 Tomlinson, Encyclopedia of Useful Arts, 1854, ii, 1035. Ibberson, in his 
Woolen Manufacturers’ Guide, 1853, p. 13, says: “‘The present defective system of 
piecing the roll-cardings is destined to improvement. If the condenser be only 
properly managed, it will eradicate a great many defects which are incident to 
hand-billy piecing, etc.; besides being at its time in a morning, and more eco- 
nomical in its work.”’ Also, in a description of the English woolen processes, given 
by a special number of the New York Tribune upon the occasion of the New York 
Exhibition of 1853-1854, the slubbing-billy, but not the condenser, is mentioned 
(Art and Industry at the Crystal Palace, p. 223). 

3 Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, pp. 5, 26, 27. He states that it “is 
generally now the case” that ‘‘piecing machines are used” (p. 26). In his book, 
Yorkshire, Past and Present, 1870, Baines states that the ‘“‘old billey has been done 
away with,” as one of the changes in woolen machinery “ during the past thirteen 
years” (p. 665). 

4 From review of Alcan’s Traité du Travail des Laines, 1866, contained in 
Bulletin, 1870-1871, p. 417. 

Picard in his Bilan d’un Siecle, after stating that “les cardes A laine fournissaient 
encore des loquettes, alors que depuis longtemps les cardes 4 coton produisaient des 
rubans continus,” says: “‘il fallut en France la loi sur le travail des enfants dans les 
manufactures pour faire adopter le type de carde enfin dit carde américaine” 
(iv, 199). 

5 Possibly the Goulding apparatus was earliest used in the manufacture of coarse 
goods, blanket yarn, etc., and subsequently applied to the production of finer yarns. 
Thus a British investigator in 1855 remarks of the French industry that “‘the ‘con- 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 107 


Grothe, apparently thinking of continental Europe as a whole, 
says that “Goulding’s Construction” gained ground very slowly, 
while for Germany in particular the spread of this device dated 
from an adaptation made in 1839 by one Gétze of Chemnitz.! 

Obviously, then, if we may suppose the American industry to 
have adopted Goulding’s invention by the middle of the thirties 
—a supposition not too forced in such a growing manufac- 
ture as ours in that period——the domestic producers had 
secured a substantial advantage over their foreign competitors, 
an advantage which was to persist for some fifteen or twenty 
years.” 


2. Spinning Machines. 


In tracing the technical development in the spinning process of 
the wool manufacture, one is venturing upon ground that has 
been much less well explored than the course of advance in the 
carding section. Neither in this country nor in England has any- 
one with a technological bent made an investigation, defining the 
character of the machines employed at various periods, clarifying 
the frequently undiscriminating use of names, and recording the 
spread of the several types of apparatus. Moreover, the employ- 
ment of machines of similar names in both the cotton and wool- 
manufacturing industries often leads to confusion or doubt. 
However, treading his way carefully among these difficulties, one 


denser’ has been long in use for the manufacture of some classes of goods and is now 
being employed for the spinning of yarn for woolen cloth” (British Factory In- 
spector’s Report, in British Documents, 1856 [2031], p. 64). 

1 Grothe, Technologie der Gespinnstfasern, p. 571. He states: ‘‘Goulding’s Con- 
struction gewann Boden, obwohl auch sehr langsam. Seine Vorrichtung ward von 
Mercier (1835), und von Walton (1837), verbessert. Endlich brachte Gétze in 
Chemnitz (1839) die heute noch gebriuch Continue-vorrichtung am Feinkrempel 
an und von da ab verbreitete sich dieselbe, und die Vorspinnerei mittels besonderer 
Jenny trat in den Hintergrund.”’ 

2 The development of automatic operation in the card-clothing manufacture de- 
serves passing notice. At the close of the Revolutionary War card-clothing, then 
wholly for hand cards in this country, was produced wholly by hand: the holes 
punched in the leather, the teeth cut, shaped, and inserted into the leather, all by 
slow, manual operation. Then by a series of American inventions, chiefly those of 
Pliny Earle of Leicester, Massachusetts, the entire process was made automatic, 
and within the scope of a single machine (Bulletin, 1874-1875, p. 432; tbid., 1899, 
pp. 235-236; Kittredge, American Card Clothing Industry, passtm). 


108 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


can yet, I believe, secure a reasonably accurate picture of the 
advance in this field, and especially the situation in the American 
industry around 1830. 

In many respects there are similarities between the lines of 
development in the spinning section of the American industry, 
at least through the first decades of the nineteenth century, and 
in the carding section already discussed. Superseding the simple 
colonial implements came an imported apparatus, which for a 
time dominated the American manufacture, and which had a 
more important immediate effect upon the household manufac- 
ture of cloths. Subsequently, there were improvements in this 
mechanism, apparently independent of foreign progress along the 
same lines; and finally came a domestic development—not as 
commanding as the Goulding card, to be sure, but of substantial 
merit—which was to form the basis of our operative methods 
for several future decades. } 

Already reference has frequently been made to the spinning 
jenny: its first appearance in Philadelphia in 1775, the use of 
such a machine at the Hartford factory, and the building of 
jennies by the Scholfields.1 Here again the influence of the 
Scholfields in disseminating technical knowledge of this machine 
was particularly important; and not enough credit, it seems to 
me, has heretofore been given them in this connection. Still, 
jennies had for some years been known and employed in the 
American cotton manufacture, machines which apparently were 
more closely akin to the mechanisms of similar name used in 
the wool manufacture than was the case with the carding ap- 
paratus employed in the two industries. Again, there were 
sources of information concerning the British wool-working jenny, 
which were independent of the Scholfields. Seemingly Mayall, 
already referred to in relation to the carding machine’s intro- 
duction, also had knowledge of the spinning apparatus. In 
another case, one James Beaumont in 1799 sent to America plans | 
of a spinning machine which he found employed near Hudders- 
field, England.’ 

In substance this machine was a combination of a number of 

1 See above, pp. 63, 66, 68, 88, 93. 2 Bagnall, p. 270. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 109 


spinning wheels.’ Numerous strands of roping, already prepared 
on the billy, were passed between the two jaws of a wooden clasp 
and fastened to a corresponding number of spindles mounted 
upon a stationary frame. After a certain length of these strands 
had been paid out, the portion of the machine containing the 


ib: 


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Fic. 2. Hargreaves’s Spinning Jenny. a 


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clasp was drawn away from the spindles, the latter at the same 
time being made to revolve by means of a hand-crank. In this 
manner, the roping was attenuated and at the same time twisted, 
reducing the diameter and simultaneously giving strength to the 
forming yarn.” Obviously this apparatus duplicates in a me- 
chanical way the operations performed by the hand of the spinner 
acting in concert with the spindle of the spinning wheel. But the 
gain in productivity was astounding. The Jennies mounted from 
eight to fifty spindles, and in some such measure multiplied the 
yarn-production of the one-spindle spinning wheel.’ 

1 Indeed, the inventor, James Hargreaves, is said to have conceived the idea of 
the jenny when his wife’s spinning wheel fell over by accident and the wheel con- 
tinued revolving. The British patent for the jenny is dated 1767. 

2 It is one of the principles of woolen spinning, preserved in the modern woolen 
“mule,” that by drafting (or drawing-out) and twisting at the same time the twist 
tends to go into the thinner and weaker portions of the yarn, adding to their 
strength and simultaneously diverting the draft to the thicker portions of the 
strand. In this way an even yarn is produced. 


3 One relatively small jenny was said to spin more and better yarn, attended by 
one woman, in one day than in four days at the old spinning wheel (Massachusetts 


IIo THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Although the jenny, after its first introduction, became a part 
of the normal factory equipment, its more immediate effect, as 
just suggested, was upon the household system of cloth manu-_ 
facture, particularly in the period after the embargo had been 
imposed. The jennies which Arthur Scholfield was manufac- 
turing for sale in 1809 (Hayes says in 1806) were intended for 
family use. Then followed a small flock of similar machines, 
bearing various names, but apparently all adaptations of the 
English jenny, —further evidence of the increasing use of this ap- 
paratus. Among such new devices, the “‘Portable Spinner” of 
Rev. Burgis Allison of Philadelphia is perhaps the one most often 
mentioned. Mease in his Archives describes this as follows: “It 
is simple and takes up but a little more room than a common 
spinning wheel. They may be constructed to drive from ten to 
fifteen spindles, and set to spinning yarn to any degree of fineness 
admitted by the wool.” ? Ebenezer Herrick’s ‘‘Domestic Spin- 

er,’ later recommended by Arthur Scholfield himself, carried 
only six or eight spindles;* and John Brown’s “‘Farmer’s Spin- 
ner’’ could spin eight to twelve threads at one time.* 

But the jenny or other similar apparatus does not seem to have 
become so widely adopted as was the power-driven carding ma- 
chine. True, the amount of attention devoted by inventors to 
Spy, December 25, 1811); while the larger ones “‘made by the ingenious Mr. Schol- 
field,’ containing twenty to thirty spindles, were alleged to spin from twenty to 
thirty runs of fine yarn as compared with one and one-half on the old system when 
the wool was carded by hand, or three when the wool was carded on the machine 
(Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 178). 

Certain English figures nae that while it took two women ha three children, 
employing the spinning wheel, 612 hours to spin a given quantity of yarn, by 


the use of the jenny a man, a woman, and two children could produce the 
same amount in seventy-two and one-half hours (British Documents, 1840 [43], 
P- 439). 

1 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 23. 

2 Mease, Archives, iii, 191. The machine was patented first April 27, 1812, and 
was apparently improved in patents of March 3, 1813 and June 28, 1814. 

3 Pittsfield Sun, March 2, 1811. The dimensions are given as: 6 feet x 2144 
x 2%. 

4 Massachusetts Spy, October 12, 1814; patented May 12, 1813. Other machines 
might be noted: Daniel Read’s “‘ Pleasant Spinner,”’ patented September 10, 1811; 
and Ebenezer Smith’s “family billy and jenny,” patented June 28, 1814. Thomas 
Jefferson had a jenny of six spindles (Bishop, ii, 188, note). 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT III 


this line of work indicates a considerable market for the product; 
and, also, as early as 1810 Gallatin speaks of “‘jennies’”? and 
“other family spinning machines” as already “introduced in 
many places.” But there is evidence pointing in the contrary 
direction. For example, in 1809 a resolution was passed at a 
gathering of prominent individuals in Pittsfield (met, curiously 
enough, to organize a ‘‘ Woolen Manufactory’’): ‘that the intro- 
duction of Spinning Jennies, as is practiced in England, into 
private families, is strongly recommended . . . since . . . it is 
by this labour saving machine that the American people will suc- 
cessfully rival the Europeans.” ? Again, the Census of 1810 re- 
ported only 299 jennies for the whole country. Moreover, after 
the conclusion of peace in 1815, references to the household use 
of this machine are quite infrequent. Apparently it was a 
phenomenon of the disturbed years of embargo and war, when 
the household manufacture expanded to fill the abnormal do- 
mestic requirements. 

In the factories, however, the jenny won a dominant place. 
From the time of the Byfield factory through 1830, the mill with- 
out one or more jennies was indeed the exception. This increased 
factory use of the machine, one may also note, had led to an en- 
largement of its capacity. The early ones had usually contained 
from thirty to fifty spindles; and the largest that was reported 
during the period before 1815, was one of seventy-two spindles, 
erected in West Cambridge, now Arlington, Massachusetts.’ By 
1820, however, there seems to have been an appreciable advance: 
in the census of that year, the number of spindles per machine 
ranged from forty-four to one hundred and twenty, and the usual 

1 State Papers, Finance, li, 427. 

2 Pittsfield Sun, January 7, 1809. Possibly this resolution was dictated by a de- 
sire to disarm hostility to the proposed mill on the part of household producers, for 
the vote ends: ‘The establishment of an extensive Factory will always go hand in 
hand with private enterprise.’”” However, ten months later, it could only be said 
that ‘‘a few” jennies had been put into operation “‘in this vicinity” (Pittsfield Sun, 
November 18, 1809); and as late as September, 1811, it was evidently thought a 
matter of public interest to see a spinning jenny in actual operation, as such a ma- 
chine was carried in the procession of the Berkshire Cattle Show of that year (zbid., 


September 28, 1811). 
3 Taft, Notes, p. 44. 


112 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


number between fifty and seventy.1 The limit then had ap- 
parently been nearly reached; for with every added spindle it 
became increasingly difficult to control properly this hand-driven 
machine. The largest jenny to which I have found reference was 
one of a hundred and fifty spindles, in operation at Uxbridge, 
Massachusetts, in 1824.” 

The desire to increase the productivity of these factory spin- 
ning machines turned manufacturers’ attention to the possibilities 
of harnessing them to power. For this purpose the jenny was not 
really suitable, and there are no authenticated cases of this appa- 
ratus being adapted to power work. Other machines, however, 
were tried. William Humphreys, of Connecticut, in 1811 pat- 
ented a machine for spinning wool by water-power, by means of 
which, it was said, twelve spindles would perform the work oi a 
forty-spindle jenny.? A manufacturer of Northampton, Massa- 
chusetts, it was reported in 1812, “‘employs and moves by water 
a carding machine and 150 spindles, and by hand 410 spindles.” 4 
There was another power-driven device, so it is said, built at 


1 State Papers, Finance, iv, 28-223; especially pp. 40, 42, 48, 59, and 102, where 
the sizes are stated or readily deducible. 

However, Mr. William H. Vose, later treasurer of the Fitchburg (Massachusetts) 
Woolen Mill, speaks of working in this factory as late as 1828 and 1829 as spinner 
upon a jenny of only eight spindles (Census of 1880, xx, 392). Possibly, of course, 
this was a machine kept for learners. 

? Wheelock, in Chapin, Address, p. 142. Some doubt might arise as to whether 
the larger jennies above mentioned were really driven by hand. I can only say 
that I have found no clear cases of jennies harnessed to animal or water power. 

The jenny had come to be included as part of that rough unit for measuring or 
stating the capacity of a woolen mill, the so-called “set.” Prior to 1830-1840, says 
North (Bulletin, 1901, p. 277), a “set” consisted of three single or two double card- 
ing machines with a billy and two jennies. 

3 Warden, Account of the United States, 1819, ii, 31: Here, eight years after the 
date of its patent, this machine is specified as one product of Connecticut genius. 
Did it survive that long? 

There are earlier cases of power-driven machinery, but one is not sure that spin- 
ning machines are included. In 1807, the apparatus of the Elkton (Maryland) fac- 
tory, ‘‘made by artists from Europe,” was said to be “‘all moved by water” (Bag- 
nall, p. 235). Clark (p. 565) gives this as a case of wool-jennies worked by power. 

4 Pittsfield Sun, January 11, 1812; also Niles, i, 292. : 

A writer in the National Intelligencer, August 6, 1810, states that “‘the spinning 
(of wool) is done by water, and horse and steam;”’ but does not go into particulars 
as to the type of machine employed. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 113 


Providence in 1813 under the direction of an English superin- 
tendent, in which the threads were drawn upwards, vertically, 
instead of horizontally as in the jenny and other wool-spinning 
machines.! 

But the course of development which proved ultimately most 
successful was that employing the spinning jack as its basis. 
This latter machine was essentially but a modification of the 
spinning jenny. In it the spindles, instead of being fixed upon a 
stationary frame as in the jenny, were placed on the moving por- 
tion of the machine, the latter part having been enlarged to ac- 
commodate them. Contrariwise, the mechanism which held fast 
‘the roving during the actual spinning operation was transferred 
to the rear and stationary portion, and the clasp of the jenny was 
now replaced by a pair of rollers. Such an arrangement per- 
mitted an easier application of power. Indeed, the modern 
spinning machine, the so-called ‘‘mule,”’ is essentially but a 
power-driven jack, to which some of the structure of the cotton 
‘mule’? — really a mule — has been rather recently adapted.’ 

The first “‘spinning jack” to which I have found reference is 
the one set up by James Scholfield about 1802 at North Andover. 


1 Edwin M. Stone in the “‘Semi-Centennial” of the Providence Journal, 1870, 
p. 16. 

* Inasmuch as modern industrial practice has decided upon the use of the term 
*“mule” for the woolen spinning machine of the moving carriage type, the conten- 
tion that it is not properly so called would seem a wholly fruitless matter; but I be- 
lieve an understanding of the difference between the two machines is an aid in un- 
tangling some of the technical history. Students of English industrial development 
will recall that Crompton’s mule, first used in the cotton manufacture, derived its 
name from the fact that it was in a sense a cross between Arkwright’s water-frame 
and Hargreaves’s jenny: it embraced the draft between two sets of rollers, which 
was the chief feature of the one, and the carriage draft and twist, which charac- 
terized the other. In no wool-spinning machine of this general sort, however, has 
there been any roller drawing, but always and solely the type of draft which existed 
in the original jenny. Yet there is, as suggested above, some justification for the 
modern use of the term ‘“‘mule.’”’ After the ‘‘hand jack” had been made wholly 
automatic, the heavier framework of the cotton mule was incorporated with the 
more distinctive features of the wool-spinning apparatus. Probably, then, the 
most accurate term to describe this particular hybrid would be the old French one, 
““mule-jenny.”’ However, in the following discussion I have made the text conform 
to modern terminology, at the same time trying to distinguish between the real and 
the pseudo mules wherever necessary. Cf. Grothe, Technologie der Gespinnstfasern, 
p. 568, note. 


II4 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


This apparently was an imported product, as James did not come 
to America until his brothers, John and Arthur, had become in- 
terested in the Byfield enterprise.1 It was a hand-worked ma- 
chine, and probably the same apparatus which in England came 
to be called a ‘‘wool-spinning mule.’”’ Probably other machines 
of the same sort were the two jacks employed by the Waltham 
Cotton and Woolen Company in 1810.? John Scholfield, Jr., also 
had a spinning-jack, one of sixty spindles, at Jewett City, Con- 
necticut, in 1816.3 When next mention is found, however, they 
were being harnessed to power. A jack is said to have been oper- 
ated by water-power in the fall or winter of 1814-1815 at Ux- 
bridge, Massachusetts, or perhaps even at a slightly earlier date; * 
and again, in 1819, at Peacedale, Rhode Island.° 

Just what is meant by the phrase ‘‘operated by water-power”’ 
in this case is far from clear, nor have I found any means of ex- 
plication. The mechanical operations of the modern “mule”’ may 
be divided into four groups: the delivery of the roping by the 
rollers and the rotation of the spinning spindles; the outward 
motion of the carriage, now holding the spindles, the speed of 
which changes after a distance equivalent to the length of new 
roping has been traversed; the return of the carriage to its orig- 
inal position with the spindles directly under the rollers; and the 
winding of the completed yarn upon the spindles, which actually 
takes place during the return movement of the carriage. Whether 
one or several of these groups of motions constituted the earliest 
‘‘operation by water power” seems a question which it is now 
impossible to solve. Foreign experience, at least in so far as 
France and Germany are concerned, suggests that the application 
of power probably came gradually.® On the other hand, there is 


1 Bagnall, p. 307. 

* Starbuck, ‘Waltham Manufactories,” in History of Middlesex County, 
lil, 751. 

3 Bagnall, p. 450. 

4 Taft, Bulletin, 1896, p. 21. 

5 Hayes, Bulletin, 1879, p. 19. Hayes, however, speaks of it as “‘the first record 
which we can find of the application of power to spinning wool in this country.” 

6 Alcan, Traité du Travail des Laines, 1866, i, 465, distinguishes between the 
‘“demi self-acting, ou le renvidage a lieu 4 la main” and the completely automatic 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT II5 


nothing definite in American data, nor for that matter in the cor- 
responding English data, which intimates this actually to have 
been the course of development.'! However, there is negative evi- 
dence in the failure of such investigators as Hayes and North to 
speak of any such change in wool-spinning technique between ap- 
proximately 1830 and 1860-1870, when the completely automatic 
mule was introduced.” Accordingly, it seems probable that the 
portions of the process to which power was applied were those 
which we know were conducted in an automatic or semi-auto- 
matic manner just prior to this later development of the modern 
self-actor or fully automatic mule. These were the first two 
groups of motions above specified.’ If this be true, the conduct 
of the operation was as follows: the roping was delivered auto- 
matically, when the carriage of the machine reached the proper 
position under the rollers; and the spindles were rotated by power 
at a predetermined speed while the carriage was on its outward 
traverse. This outward movement itself was accomplished in 
only a quasi-mechanical manner; some momentum was imparted 
to the carriage by a loose driving belt, but the rate of motion and 
especially the intermediate change in rate was controlled by the 


machine, the “‘self-acting.” Cf. also Picard, Le Bilan dun Siécle, iv, 210. 

The German data show a further subdivision. For example, Quandt (Die Nie- 
derlausitzer Schafwollindustrie, p.177) says: ‘“‘Das Ein-und Ausfahren des Wagens 
geschah zuerst durch die Hand des Spinners. Dann machte man das Ausfahren 
selbstthatig, und nur das Einfahren besorgte noch der Spinner... . Nach vielen 
Miihen brachte es endlich der Techniker so weit, dass er das Ein-und Ausfahren 
des Wagens selbstthatig von der Maschine ausfiihren lassen konnte.’”’? The second 
state was called “der Half-Selfactor,”’ as in the French terminology. Cf. Grothe, 
p. 586, note. 

1 The English used the word ‘‘mule” or “wool-spinning mule” for a machine 
which was apparently similar to our power-driven jack, except perhaps in some of 
the details of construction. (See below.) 

The only reference that I have found with respect to the corresponding English 
development refers to the English cotton manufacture. Chapman (The Lancashire 
Cotton Industry, p. 68) states that “‘some time before the self-actor appeared, power 
was used to drive out the mule-carriage.”’ 

2 North (Bulletin, 1901, p. 275) says: “‘It isa curious fact, in view of the many 
advances made in other mechanical departments, that the hand-jack (just what he 
means by this is uncertain) continued to be employed in all our woolen mills until 
after the Civil War.’”’ Then came the “‘self-operating” jacks and mules. 

3 There may have been some delay in the transfer of all the component motions 
to power, but probably no considerable delay. 


116 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


spinner. To check the advance of the carriage, he merely leaned 
his weight against its front bar. The return of the carriage was 
entirely the duty of the spinner, though perhaps in the case of 
the larger machines he had the assistance of another loose belt; 
while the winding of the completed yarn and the building of the 
bobbin were also done entirely by the operative.! 

The adoption of the power-driven jack in this country is par- 
ticularly difficult to trace, partly because of the loose terminology 
used in describing spinning machines, and partly because soon 
the spinning capacity of a mill ceased to be given in terms of ma- 
chines and was stated only in that of spindleage. The transfer 
from jenny to jack, however, appears to have come in the latter 
twenties and early thirties. The manufacturers who testified in 
the tariff hearings of 1828 spoke, to be sure, only of jennies; but 
they were chiefly makers of fine cloths; and that section of the 
industry seems to have retained the hand-machine longer than 
the rest.2, On the other hand, certain machine-builders in 1832 
reported the construction of jacks alone, but made no mention of 
jennies.2 Mr. Vose narrates that after the destruction of the 


1 Obviously, the spinner was still an important factor in the process. More will 
be said of him later. 

My knowledge of the operation as it existed just prior to the introduction of the 
complete self-actor was derived in part from interviews with men in the industry, 
especially Mr. Nathaniel Stevens of the M. T. Stevens & Sons Company, and Mr. 
William Kelly, for thirty years spinner or boss-spinner for the Olney Woolen Com- 
pany, Cherry Valley, Massachusetts. Mr. Kelly had worked on the semi-auto- 
matic jacks; and he did not remember a time and had never heard of a time prior 
to the introduction of the self-actor when anything but the above-described sort of 
semi-automatic jack was used. ; 

However, Mr. John P. Wood writes me: “My recollection of mules in use 
before the full automatic is that their movements were all actuated by the mill 
power. They were ‘hand-operated’ only in the sense that the operator shifted 
the mechanism to change from one function to another by hand. For the full 
automatic mule the change from one stage of operation or function to another 
was accomplished without the intervention of the operator.’’ This description 
does not tally with that given in the text, though it may cover only a mechanism 
intermediate between that which I have outlined and the fully automatic 
apparatus. The whole matter is puzzling and I speak with considerable 
uncertainty. 

2 20th Cong., rst Sess., House of Representatives, Report No. 115. 

3 McLane’s Report, 1832, i, 518-519, 572-573. See also Worcester Spy, August 
20, 1834. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT Lip rs 


Fitchburg Woolen Mill by fire in the early thirties, the jennies 
which had been employed were replaced by jacks. The Pontoo- 
suc Manufacturing Company, possessing no jacks in 1827, had 
acquired four by 1835, although still holding on to some of its old 
jennies.” It seems probable, indeed, that during the decade of the 
thirties “the roll carding machine, the billy, and the jenny were 
(all) being thrown aside and no longer retained except by small 
establishments that depended upon neighborhood trade.”’ ® 
Meanwhile, a somewhat different type of spinning machine had 
been devised in this country, called the ‘‘Brewster,’’ after its in- 
ventor, Gilbert Brewster of Norwich, Connecticut. As early as 
1813, he was advertising a ‘‘Globe-Spinner,’’ a machine which 
was described as suitable for spinning ‘‘Sheep’s Wool, Cotton, 
Flax and Tow, by Water’”’ and which was said to be already in 
operation in a Rhode Island woolen mill. It was stated, prob- 
ably with exaggeration, to be manageable by small children, to 
occupy but about a fourth part of the space required for a jenny of 
the same spindleage, and to spin equally well at only a third the 
cost. Seemingly improved later, especially by changes patented 
in 1824, the Brewster became a real self-operating machine.’ 


1 Census of 1880, XX, 391. 

2 Records of the Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company, Inventories of 1827 and 
1835. 

3H. G. Kittredge in Dry Goods Economist, Jubilee Number, 1896, p. 81. He 
speaks of the decade 1840-1850 as ‘‘the end of the transitory period,” thinking 
primarily of the acannon of the fancy loom as completing “‘the equilibrium . . . in 
factory operations” and ushering “‘the era of modern wool manufacturing.” 
Although not clear on the point, apparently the scrapping of the roll carding ma- 
chine, billy, and jenny had in his opinion been going on for some time before; and 
the attainment of “equilibrium” etc., was delayed only by the tardy invention of 
the fancy power loom. 

4 Providence Gazette, March 6, 1813. Niles, in 1822 (xxii, 85), speaks warmly of 
Brewster’s machine for spinning wool. 

5 Bishop, li, 297. 

Grothe, Technologie der Gespinnsifasern, p. 605, gives credit to Brewster for the 
development of a self-actor prior to Roberts. He adds: “‘Freilich ist dieser Selfactor 
Spater durch die Construction Roberts und Smith (1834) tiberholt, aber er zeigt 
doch eine bedeutende Combinationsgabe.”” Richardson, in his History of Woon- 
socket (p. 131), also sets the machine down as a “‘self-operating mule.” He adds 
that it was a rather clumsy affair and was abandoned after being in use but a short 
time. 


118 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Although hailed at that time as a machine which would soon 
leave the English manufacturers ‘‘much behind us,” ? it appar- 
ently came to little. It found scant favor in the cotton trade, and 
in the wool manufacture was never widely used. Samuel Slater 
appears to have found it unsatisfactory;? and in the investi- 
gations of the Committee on Manufactures in 1828 the reports of 
wool manufacturers were at best half-hearted.? After that time 
the Brewster disappears.’ It is noteworthy, however, as a prede- 
cessor of Roberts’s self-acting mule, patented in England in 1825, 
which in turn became the pattern of most subsequent self-oper- 
ating spinning machines. 

In conclusion, it is of interest and value to compare the de- 
velopment of power spinning here and abroad, especially because 
of certain misconceptions which have crept into American writ- 
ings on the subject. In England the hand jenny was the pre- 
vailing type of wool-spinning machine throughout the latter years 
of the eighteenth century, its more general introduction coming 
after 1785.6 This apparatus fitted in with the quasi-handicraft 


1 Niles, xxvi, 363. 
2 An entry on the books of his Webster mill reads: 
“July 16, 1824. 
Gilbert Brewster, Cr. 
By Amount of Expenses in Moving Wool Spinning Machine from 
Middletown (Conn.) to this Place & from this Place to Middle- 


3 20th Cong., rst Sess., House of Representatives, Report No. 115. 

A typical view is that of an Oriskany (New York) manufacturer: ‘‘We have a 
patent machine for spinning called a ‘Brewster.’ We spin warp on this machine, 
and consider the mode a very good one. The machine, however, is subject to get- 
ting out of repair. We also spin a part of the warp, and all the filling, in the usual 
mode” (on the jenny) (p. 80). It was generally testified that at best the Brewster 
was suited only for warp yarn, and that it was likely to get out of order. See pp. 83, 
89, 90, 96, 105, 123. 

4 Thus, while a “Brewster frame” appears in an inventory of the Pontoosuc 
Manufacturing Company of 1827, no such machine is mentioned in one of 1835 
(Records of the Company). 

5 For example, North (Bulletin, 1901, p. 255) states that “in England power 
spinning was in general use in the wool manufacture in the latter part of the eight- 
eenth century.” 

6 Cunningham, p. 653. Heaton (Yorkshire Woolen and Worsted Industries, 
p- 352) puts the period of its introduction ‘the third quarter of the eighteenth 
century;” but it was only invented in 1767! 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT I19 


organization of the Yorkshire manufacture, and there secured a 
firm root.’ But in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, 
wool-spinning factories or fully integrated woolen mills were ris- 
ing, and in them there was a demand, as in this country, for more 
efficient and productive machinery. This led to the modification 
of the mule, which, it is stated, was introduced into Yorkshire 
about 1824 or 1825, and in the West of England around 1828.? 
This was apparently the “wool-spinning mule” described by 
Ure, which in fact is exactly the power-driven jack of American 
experience as far as its automatic action is concerned.? The adop- 
tion of the fully automatic mule did not occur until a later 
period.* 

On the Continent, the progress was slower. In France, hand 
spinning had scarcely disappeared by 1830, according to Picard; 
and after that the old hand jenny or “‘métier 4 pince”’ maintained 
its hold until about the middle of the nineteenth century, when 
it was replaced by the ‘‘mule-jenny”’ or ‘‘mule-jenny ordinaire,” 
the ‘‘demi self-acting.”’ ° Of Germany, less is known.. In the his- 


1 The small manufacturers of Yorkshire, who worked in their own homes or 
small shops, could install one of these machines. In other cases they could “put 
out” the work of spinning to households which did possess such a machine. On the 
other hand, there was no place for larger, power-driven machines in such an organ- 
ization. In Bischoff (ii, 396) it is stated that “the jenny is still (1842) used to some 
extent in Yorkshire,’ where the simple handicraft system of production was 
retained. 

2 British Documents, 1840 [43], p. 583; ibid. [220], p. 370. Spinning mills were 
also set up by and operated for a group of small domestic weavers. 

* Ure, Philosophy of Manufactures, 1835, pp. 183-185. A portion of the de- 
scription of this mechanism is as follows: The “rollers, by means of a peculiar 
mechanism driven by the main axis of the machine, deliver at each movement of 
the carriage, the length of roving requisite for one stretch. . . . The spinner is 
saved from the care and exertion of bringing out the carriage, that operation being 
performed by the moving power on automatic principles, as in the cotton mule; but 
he executes the winding of the yarn on the spindles, by pushing the carriage back 
to the roller beam, and depressing the faller wire,”’ etc. to make a regular cop. 

4 Although William Kelly had in 1792 made the mule self-operating, his mechan- 
ism was not practically successful until improved by Richard Roberts in 1825. 
These devices applied only to cotton spinning. Not until 1832,when Roberts had 
invented his radial arm, or sector, was the woolen mule made self-acting (Bram- 
well, Wool-Carders’ Vade Mecum, p. 381). The adoption of the machine in the 
wool manufacture took place then but slowly. 

6 Picard, Bilan d’un Siécle, iv, 202-203, 209-210. 


Tee THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


tory of Niederlausitz, the only German wool-manufacturing 
region which has been investigated thoroughly, the simple jenny 
is spoken of as coming in in the forties, while the ‘“‘ Halb-Selfactor”’ 
is said to have appeared there only in the beginning of the seven- 
ties! 

Obviously, then, here as in the carding process the American 
industry was not tardy in the adoption of labor-saving mechan- 
isms. The advantage or priority was not so great as in the other 
case, —probably with respect to England it was not appreciable. 
Still, that we were not behind the British is a sufficient credit to 
our infant industry. In comparison with the Continental de- 
velopment, the American manufacture was more forward, even 
as it had been in the case of the carding apparatus. 


3. Weaving Machines. 


The history of improvement in the weaving process is a rela- 
tively simple affair. This follows in part from the fact that from 
the earliest times, even to the present day, there has been no 
fundamental change in the manner of weaving woolen fabrics. 
The machines for other portions of the wool-cloth manufacture, 
such as carding, spinning, and various operations in finishing, 
have been so modified that only a student of textile history would 
recognize in them the old hand methods. In the weaving process, 
however, the modern loom is essentially only the old hand loom 
with the earlier manual operations performed by power.’ 

The development in weaving prior to 1830 consisted of but 
three important features: the adoption of the flying shuttle for 
hand looms, the spread of broad looms, and the application of 

1 Quandt, Die Niederlausiizer Schafwollindustrie, pp. 175-177. 

Apparently the full self-actor followed closely upon the heels of the half self- 
actor in this region (p. 177, note). 

2 Asa corollary to the above proposition, it follows that in the weaving operation 
there has not been the saving from improved methods of production that ensued 
from inventions in the other wool-manufacturing processes. For example, around 
1830 the wool-spinning mule could turn out a given quantity of yarn in one-fiftieth 
of the time required for hand spinning; but the power loom of that period probably 


did not make a reduction of more than 50 per cent in weaving, even compared with 
the hand-loom weaving without the fly-shuttle (British Documents, 1840 [43], 


PP. 430-441). 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT IZ] 


power to both narrow and broad machines. Of the first, little 
need be said, since the hand loom itself was so soon and so largely 
superseded. Apparently the flying shuttle, by means of which 






Working Parts of 
a Power Loom. 


the labor of a weaver’s assistant was eliminated, was first em- 
ployed in this country about 1788 in Rhode Island.! But spread 
of its use could not have been rapid; for it is narrated that a 
manufactory of flying shuttles, started in Philadelphia in 1793, 
shortly moved to Nova Scotia from want of encouragement and 
support in the United States.” As late as 1810, Tench Coxe, 


1 Prior to the adoption of the fly or spring-shuttle, the weaver had to throw or 
hand the shuttle (which contained the weft or latitudinal threads of the fabric) 
from one side to the other of the loom; and in the case of a broad loom, it was cus- 
tomary among professional weavers to employ a youth to assist the handicrafts- 
man. The boy stood at the one side of the loom and the weaver at the other, and 
they passed the shuttle from side to side. The fly-shuttle consisted of a pair of 
blocks, one on either side of the loom, between which a loose rope was run. The 
weaver, by grasping the rope near the middle and pulling first in one and then in 
the other direction, could send the shuttle flying from one side to the other of the 
loom, the shuttle at the end of its traverse coming to rest against the other block, 
ready for the next (and opposite) pull. 

? Bishop, i, 333, note. 


122 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


commenting upon the figures of looms with fly-shuttles given in 
the Census of 1810, stated that ‘‘though it (the fly-shuttle) has 
been known in this country many years, more than ninety-nine 
one-hundredths of our shuttles are not of that description.” ! 
Seemingly it gained little foothold in the household industry, 
partly because most of the household looms were probably of 
the narrow variety. In the budding factories it was presumably 
employed, in so far as weaving departments formed portions of 
these mills, but there is little definite evidence to indicate this 
fact.” 

The wider adoption of the broad loom was a result of the in- 
creased manufacture of the famous broadcloth in the period fol- 
lowing the Revolutionary War, and especially in that after the 
imposition of the embargo. As already intimated, the looms of 
the colonial period and those which were employed in the con- 
tinuing household production of wool fabrics were probably 
narrow looms for the most part, looms capable of weaving cloths 
not exceeding a yard in width. The English broadcloth was 
always woven, indeed secured its name originally from being 
woven, in much greater width. This cloth was fulled in an 
exceptional degree after it was woven, thereby shrinking in 
width as well as in length. Accordingly it had to be “set” or 
arranged in the loom to allow for this shrinkage. Broad looms 
therefore reached the width of ten quarters, or two and a half 
yards. 

Though rarely referred to prior to the Revolution, broad looms 
are mentioned with increasing frequency as the years roll on. 
The Hartford factory apparently had broad looms. The Schol- 
fields upon their arrival in Boston constructed a loom suitable for 
producing broadcloths, and such apparatus was reported at vari- 
ous times as part of the equipment in their several mills. The 

1 State Papers, Finance, ii, 677. The Census figures were: looms, 325,392; 
looms with fly-shuttles, 224 (p. 693). 

Another indication of their novelty at this period is the operation of a loom 
equipped with a fly-shuttle upon “‘a large stage drawn by Oxen”’ in the procession 
of the Berkshire Cattle Show in 1811 (Pittsfield Sun, September 28, 1811). 


2 Taft (Notes, pp. 46-47) gives one case a mill in Uxbridge, Massachusetts, 
where the fly-shuttle was used. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 123 


Housatonick Manufacturing Company at Pittsfield had four 
broad and three narrow looms in 1816; and in the same year John 
Scholfield, Jr., at Jewett City, Connecticut, had an equipment of 
four broad and seven narrow machines.! By that time, the broad 
apparatus was so widely and generally employed as of itself to 
suggest a peculiarly large production of broadcloth, a matter to 
which reference will subsequently be made.” 

The final step in the development of weaving technique was 
already in progress. Disregarding the Elkton (Maryland) fac- 
tory, in which the machinery ‘‘made by artists from Europe” was 
indefinitely stated to be ‘‘all moved by water,” the first mention 
of a power loom employed on wool goods is one patented by 
Messrs. Shepherd and Thorpe of Taunton, Massachusetts, in 
1816. A couple of years later, sixteen looms worked by water are 
said to have been engaged on satinets at Chelmsford, Massachu- 
setts; and in the Census of 1820 there is notice of eight power 
looms in a mill of Middlesex County, Connecticut.* 

In the early years of this next decade, the adoption of power 
looms became much more rapid. The type of machine at first 
more generally introduced was that for the narrow fabric, satinet, 
which was now growing in popularity. This was a rather coarse 
cloth, made with a cotton warp and a woolen filling. The cotton 
warp, being stronger than a woolen warp, made the cloth one 
which could more easily be woven on the early, somewhat crude 
power machines. Beside the Chelmsford installation above men- 
tioned, power looms for satinets were being made in Philadelphia 
shortly after 1820; they were in use at Uxbridge, Massachusetts, 
in 1821; and about 1822 a satinet mill in North Adams, Massa- 
chusetts, secured a power loom from Providence, Rhode Island.° 
A “Commercial Directory”? published in 1823 indicates that 
several satinet factories in Massachusetts had adopted this 
mechanism, mention being made of five separate establish- 

1 Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 469; Bagnall, p. 459. 

2 See below, pp. 195-196. 

% Bishop, ii, 233. For similar instance, see Niles, x, 384. 

4 Allen, History of Chelmsford, 1820, p. 84. 


5 Scharf and Westcott, History of Philadelphia, p. 2304; Wheelock, in Chapin, 
Address at Uxbridge, p. 141; Smith, History of Berkshire County, i, 518. 


124 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


ments in which from four to fifty power or “‘water”’ looms were 
located.! 

The adaptation of the mechanical loom to broad weaving was 
not long delayed. Eight such machines were said to have been 
employed in a Connecticut broadcloth factory as early as 1820.” 
A power loom for weaving broadcloth was set up in Allendale, 
Rhode Island, in 1822; and in the following year, Messrs. Howard 
and Hovey commenced the manufacture of broad power looms 
in Worcester, Massachusetts. The Directory above quoted 
speaks of broad power looms but once — in Northampton, Mas- 
sachusetts — where of thirty-five broad looms, twelve were “of 
a new construction, worked by water.” * Probably it was after, 
rather than before 1825, that the newmechanism came into really 
wide use for the broadcloth weaving. 

The use of this machine for the production of other fabrics de- 
serves passing mention. Flannel woven on power looms was 
exhibited at the Brighton (Massachusetts) fair in November, 
1824,° and soon afterward the apparatus was generally adopted 
for that manufacture. The first notice that I have seen of its 
employment upon cassimere indicates that in the year 1826 ten 
power cassimere looms were set up in the Uxbridge (Massachu- 
setts) Woolen Mill; and then two years later power looms for the 
fabrication of kerseys were installed, it is said, at the Peacedale 
(Rhode Island) Manufacturing Company’s plant.® 

Bagnall states that by 1825 power looms “‘had already sup- 

1 Kayser, Commercial Directory, 1823, pp. 109, 110, 111, and 113. Usually the 
author speaks of water or power looms in connection with satinet mills, when he 
mentions the loom equipment at all. 

2 State Papers, Finance, iv, 56. 

3 Taft, Bulletin, 1896, p. 21; Washburn, in History of Worcester County, Massa- 
chusetts, ii, 1611, 

4 Kayser, Commercial Directory, p. 113. 

Other examples of the early adoption of the power loom for broadcloth manu- 
facture: North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 278 (Southbridge, Massachusetts); Bishop, ii, 
300 (Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company, Pittsfield, Massachusetts). Niles (xlii, 
109) speaks of the broad power loom as if it were by that time, 1832, commonly 
employed. 

5 Bishop, ii, 294. 

6 Wheelock, in Chapin, Address at Uxbridge, p. 143; Providence Board of Trade 
Journal, xxiii, 292. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 125 


planted hand looms in most of the successful woolen mills, thereby 
effecting a revolution in the industry.’”’! The facts, however, do 
not wholly bear out the first part of this assertion. The first 
mention of a power loom in the records of the Slater Mill at 
Webster, Massachusetts, occurs in 1825,2 and the Hamilton 
Woolen Company wove some goods by hand until 1830.’ Again, 
in the hearings before the Committee on Manufactures in 1828, 
when many leading wool manufacturers testified, there are indi- 
cations that the power machine had as yet failed to acquire full 
sway. A manufacturer of Dudley, Massachusetts, said: ‘‘Our 
broadcloths are woven partly by hand, and partly by the power 
loom. The cassimeres are all wove in the hand loom;” and in 
the Du Pont mill at Wilmington, Delaware, the weaving was said 
to be ‘‘done by hand looms principally.” * Finally, the long re- 
tention of hand-loom weaving in the Philadelphia district must 
be noted. In 1825 there were said to be forty-five hundred hand 
looms in the city, at a time when approximately three thousand 
of the weavers entered into a combination to raise weaving 
rates;° and toward the end of the decade an English observer 
described that area again as “‘a great seat of hand-loom manufac- 
turing and weaving.’”’® However, it is probably true that by 1825 
the introduction of the power loom in the wool manufacture had 
been well begun, and that within another five-year period the 
trend was strongly toward a general use of the machine. 

This power loom, it should be remarked, was far from being the 
power loom of today. The machine operated but two heddles 


1 Bagnall, p. 311. 

2 Slater Records: “February 28, 1826. 
Hollis Wood, Cr. 

By Daughter Almira Labour at Power Loom from May 3oth to June 

pemieeererweers ty; days ate7/6,. 00 <li OS eS $4.43” 

Other entries indicate that this was the only loom of the sort as yet in the mill. 

3 Pamphlet called A Brief Record of the Hamilton Woolen Company, p. 1 (man- 
uscript). 

4 20th Cong., rst Sess., House Documents, No. 115, pp. 82 and 123. 

5 Niles, xxviil, 159. 

6 Freedley, Philadelphia and Its Manufactures, p. 233. 

Niles (xlii, 109) speaks even of ‘‘the broad power loom”’ as if in quite common 
use by 1832. 


126 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


and one shuttle, and was adapted to the production of only the 
plainest of cloths, — fabrics which were of the simplest, so-called 
‘“‘plain’’ weave, and cloths which were of a single color or at least 
with only the simpler stripes.’ Such cloths, to be sure, formed the 
great bulk of the domestic production at this time; but soon tex- 
tile designs were destined to appear, especially designs imported 
from abroad, which led to many changes and improvements 1n 
the original power apparatus. In addition, the strength of the 
machine was to be enhanced, and improvements introduced 
whereby the strain upon the warp threads was reduced and the 
possibility thus provided for weaving the finest textures.” 

The newly rising American industry could readily adopt this 
power mechanism; but the machine did not find place so well in 
the older European manufactures. In the Yorkshire cloth in- 
dustry, the small manufacturers working in their homes or tiny 
shops could make no use of the machine.* By 1840 the apparatus 
is reported to have “‘made but little progress” in the West Rid- 
ing. In the West of England, it was not introduced until 1836, 
and in the so-called heavy woolen district (around Batley and 
Dewsbury) not until about 1850.4 In 1856 there were only 14,000 
power looms in the English woolen trade, although at the same 


1 The exact type of the earlier woolen power looms cannot now be determined. 
An old loom preserved in the Slater Mill is of the common cam or tappet variety, 
and so is similar to the looms early constructed by Lowell for the cotton manufac- 
ture. Use was apparently also made of the Scotch or Horrocks loom, which likewise 
had for some years been employed in the cotton industry (Washburn, in History of 
Worcester County, Massachusetts, ii, 1611). 

2 Among the improvements may be mentioned the increase in the number of 
heddles which could be operated by the cam loom, the development of the dobby 
loom, the adaption of the Jacquard loom to power, the increase in the number of 
shuttle boxes, and the invention of the open and closed-shed apparatus for working 
the warp movements. Some of these will be noted in later chapters. 

3 The flying shuttle, on the other hand, had been readily accepted in Yorkshire. 
Patented by Kay in 1733, it was apparently in extensive use about 1760-1770 
(Heaton, op. cit., p. 341). In the West of England, however, this device does not 
appear to have been introduced until 1796 (Cunningham, op. cit., p. 502). 

4 British Documents, 1840 [43], p. 587; [220], p. 376 (Report on the Hand-Loom 
Weavers); Bowley, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, xv,124. In the worsted 
trade, the power loom secured a much quicker distribution. It is stated that al- 
ready in 1846 the hand loom had been banished from most branches of this manu- 
facture (Clapham, Bulletin, 1908, p. 308). 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 127 


time there were 39,000 in the worsted and nearly 300,000 in the 
cotton industries.’ The period 1840 to 1860 showed a substantial 
dropping off of hand weavers in all the English wool-manufac- 
turing centers, and by the latter date the power loom may be said 
to have secured the upper hand. 

The Continent adopted the power loom with the usual tardi- 
ness.” Just when the first attempts at power weaving were made 
in France is not certain; but it was not until 1848 that the power 
loom found place in the manufacture of the light-weight “‘mer- 
inos”’ or dress-goods;* and with respect to the fabrication of 
broadcloth, it could be said as late as 1867 that the substitution 
of the power machine was as yet not general.* In Germany, the 
adoption of power weaving had hardly begun in 1850. As late 
as 1875 there were still nearly 47,000 hand looms in Germany, as 
compared with approximately 30,000 mechanical looms, —and 
we know that the large proportion of the latter were to be found 
in the younger worsted manufacture.° 


1 Baines, Journal of ihe Royal Statistical Society, 1859, p. 8. In 1836, only 2150 
power looms were reported for the woolen manufacture, of which over half were 
located in Lancashire where cloths of the mixed, cotton and wool composition were 
beginning to be produced (Baines, op. cit., p. 8; Lipson, History of the English 
Wool Manufacture, p. 188). 

One of the difficulties in way of adoption by the British industry of this new 
mechanism was the relatively small gain in output obtained from the employment 
of the power machine, especially in the case of the earlier apparatus and of the finer 
English fabrics, some of which were woven as much as nine feet wide. For example, 
in 1840, it was said with regard to the West of England production, that a power 
loom then could make only forty-two shots per minute, while a hand-loom weaver 
could make forty if he worked briskly, though, to be sure, he could not keep up 
that pace with the endurance of the machine (British Documents, 1840 [220], p. 435). 
With the improvement of the power machine, the discrepancy between these two 
performances became greater. 

2 The adoption of the flying shuttle also came after some delay. Its introduction 
into France is said to have first taken place in 1788 (Alcan, quoted in Bulletin, 
1870-1871, p. 412), but for the lighter goods, ‘‘merinos,”’ it was not employed until 
1817 (Bernoville, Laines Peignées, p. 195). In Germany, the flying shuttle is said 
not to have secured general use until the twenties of the nineteenth century 
(Schmoller, Die Entwicklung und die Krisis der deutschen Weberei, p. 10). 

3 Koechlin-Schwartz, Rapport sur les fils et tissus de laine peignée, p. 16. 

4 Chevalier, in Introduction to the Reports of the International Jury at the Paris 
Exposition of 1867, p. 163. 

5 Bachmann, Organisationsbestrebungen in der deutschen Tuch-und W ollwaren- 
industrie, p.17. See also Clapham, in Bulletin, 1908, pp. 311-312. In Niederlausitz, 


128 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


4. Finishing Machinery. 


Among the various machines utilized in putting the finishing 
touches upon the cloth or often in really “‘making” the fabric, 
discussion here must be limited to the development of two, the 
napping and shearing machines. In the colonial period, it will be 
recalled, napping was accomplished by means of hand cards, 
similar in form to those used in carding, though with the teeth 
more closely set. These were drawn over the cloth lengthwise of 
the fabric, and the nap thus raised. Besides being a slow and 
arduous process, napping required considerable skill to produce a 
smooth and equal nap over the whole piece and to avoid the pro- 
duction of tender spots in the goods.! The nap was then cut to 
an even height in the shearing operation, performed in those days 
with hand shears. These last were large clumsy instruments, 
often four feet in length and weighing sixty pounds, and calling 
for much dexterity in their manipulation. In the course of de- 
velopment within the wool manufacture, which tended to make 
the machinery automatic in action, these processes were destined 
to undergo marked change. 

The line of progress in improvement of the napping operation 
was the utilization of the cylindrical machine-form already em- 
ployed in the carding engine. This idea seems to have occurred 
first, or at least to have been embodied first in a practical ma- 
chine, by Walter Burt of Wilbraham, Massachusetts, whose 
patent is dated June 26, 1797.2, Mease gives the following ade- 
quate description of this early “gig mill”’: it “consists of teazles 
fixed in numerous small frames, which are again fixed in a cylin- 
there were in 1869 a round 800 hand looms in the woolen manufacture, and only 128 
power looms (Quandt, oP. cit., p. 198). 

1 An alternate form involved the use of teazles. Teazles are the spiny head of 
the plant called dipsacus fullonum, cut off and thoroughly dried. They possess 
spines which are slightly hooked and which are of just the proper strength to nap 
woolen cloths, strong enough to pull the wool fibers up from the back of the fabric 
and yet weak enough to break off if by chance they should go too deeply. Theyare 
of sufficient size, around three inches in length, to be handled easily. In the colonial 
days, they were placed in frames or “‘hands” about the size of the wire napping 
cards, and used in the same manner as the latter. 


2 Grothe (Bulletin, 1881, p. 60) gives the date of Burt’s patent as 1774, before 
the American Revolution! 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 129 


drical frame of about two feet diameter and composed of slats or 
ribs having groves (sc) cut through their whole length to receive 
the frames containing the teazles. The cloth passes over the gig 
mill sufficiently close to raise the nap, and winds round a cylinder 
below. The mill is turned by water or steam.” ! Somewhat later 
a machine of similar structure was devised, in which pointed 
brass wires upon a cylinder were substituted for the cylinder of 
teazles, thus initiating the competition between the napping ma- 
chine proper and the gig, between the pointed wire and the teazle, 
which has continued ever since. This brass-wire apparatus was 
in operation in 1812 at the Providence (Rhode Island) Woolen 
Manufacturing Company.? Apparently, moreover, invention 
continued. Some years later a napping machine is spoken of 
which worked both ways, backward and forward, over a piece of 
goods,—a machine of which an English manufacturer is said to 
have professed ignorance prior to his visit to this country.’ 

Indeed, the English development in this line, perhaps inde- 
pendent of the American experience, at least came somewhat 
later. The first use of modern gig-mills in England was appar- 
ently in Gloucestershire around 1802, though it is uncertain 
whether these were cylindrical machines or what Grothe speaks 
of as mere “imitations of gigging by hand.’”’* This German in- 

1 Mease, Archives, 1813, iii, 343. 

Two terms are used more or less loosely in connection with this operation, — 
gigging and napping. The former, strictly speaking, implies the use of teazles in 
the nap-raising machine. The latter is a more general term, sometimes used to 
cover any nap-raising process, and sometimes more specifically implying the use of 
a machine with a wire-covered cylinder. Again, the whole group of devices are 
spoken of occasionally as “‘cloth-raising”” machines. 

* Taft, Notes, p. 42. 

8’ Luke Baker, a manufacturer of napping machines, wrote in 1827: ‘“‘I have 
lately been acquainted with an Englishman who has worked in England for many 
years in the business of manufacturing woolen cloth; he informs me that he never saw 
a napping machine that worked both ways, either with cards or teasles, until he came 
to this country” (quoted by Wheelock, in Chapin’s Address at Uxbridge, p. 141). 

4 Mantoux, Révolution Industrielle en Angleterre, p. 425; Cunningham, of. cit., 
p. 661. The modern napping machine is quite distinct from the “‘gig-mills” which 
were prohibited by Parliament in 1552. As Mantoux says: “It is probable that 
there was nothing in common between them other than the name” (p. 425). How- 


ever, see Morris and Wood, The Golden Fleece, pp. 146-147: “‘ Gig mills were reintro- 
duced (after the Tudor prohibition) into Gloucestershire and Yorkshire about 1740.” 


130 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


vestigator gives full credit to Burt, the American inventor. It 
was not until after Burt’s time, he says, that ‘‘ mills with a rotat- 
ing barrel became common in England with improvements of 
Lewis, Price, and others. All these English machines were pat- 
ented after the gig-mills in America”’ had appeared, the fruit of 
diverse American inventions.’ Nor were there any developments 
on the Continent which throw doubt upon the claim of American 
ingenuity to priority with respect to the cylindrical nap-raising 
machine.” 

Substantial advance in the shearing operation really dates from 
the machine patented by Samuel G. Dorr, of Albany, New York, 
under date of October 20, 1792. ‘There were attempts both in 
this country and in England to adapt the old hand shears to 
power, but without appreciable success.* Dorr’s apparatus, which 
he happily called ‘‘ the wheel of knives,” consisted of a number of 
sharp blades at first placed parallel to the length of a cylindrical 
frame, though almost at once (1793) wrapped spirally around the 
cylinder, and working against a stationary blade. In the latter 
form, the shearing machine had a structure which has been imi- 
tated in the more modern lawn-mower.* Other types of machines 
varying slightly from Dorr’s model appeared soon afterward, as 
for instance the machine with an oscillating shear-cylinder, pat- 
ented by Beriah Swift, of Washington, New York, in 1806; and 


1 Grothe, Bulletin, 1881, p. 60. 

Mease states (Archives, iii, 344) that by 1813 the cylindrical gig-mills were “‘ par- 
tially’ in use in New England and New York, although hand cards were still uni- 
versally used in Pennsylvania (p. 343). However, employment of the earlier 
process apparently persisted in England much longer. Ure, writing in 1835, makes 
no mention of the new gig-mills, but narrates: ‘‘The hardest work in the cloth- 
finishing business seems to be that of the hand-raisers,” who are still using “‘teasels 
fixed in hand-frames” (Philosophy of Manufactures, p. 203). 

* For subsequent improvements, many of which had foreign origin, see Grothe, 
op. cit., and Wachs, Die Volkswirtschaftliche Bedeutung, p. 60. 

3 Mease, Archives, ili, 344; Grothe, Bulletin, 1881, p. 60. 

Grothe states, with regard to the early English inventions: ‘“‘It will be observed 
that English inventors from 1792 to 1815 (when the first English copy of Dorr’s 
machine was made) had taken out many patents for shearing machines; but all of 
them followed the construction of the old hand-shears, or the old shearing machine 
of Harmer (an Englishman), containing a series of hand-shears.” 

4 The number of cutting blades was greater, fourteen blades being embraced in 
Dorr’s original machine, while their degree of curvature was not so great. 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT I31I 


a number of these devices gained considerable prominence. 
Among the names of makers more frequently mentioned were 
those of William Hovey and his Ontario shearing machine, 
Molleneaux, and Mussey.' 

The saving derived from this new mechanism was unquestion- 
ably great. David Humphreys, the gentleman who had been in- 
strumental in the introduction of merino sheep and who later set 
up a cloth manufactory, stated in his testimonial upon a machine 
of one Eleazer Sprague: ‘‘ From our experience we judge that this 
machine will shear as close and as smooth, at one operation, as 
our best English workmen would do at two with Hand-Shears, 
and three times as fast at least; that one hand may tend three or 
four of them at once, when impelled by water — and thus the 
work of three weeks may be performed in a single day.’’? So 
great an economy of time and effort inevitably gave a marked 
stimulus to the use of such machines, and the repeated references 
to them suggest that by the close of the War of 1812, if not before 
that time, they had become a part of the normal factory equip- 
ment. In addition they were added to the equipment of the 
country fulling shop, and so with the carding machine and the 
spinning jenny served as a prop to the household manufacture as 
well as an aid in factory production.® 

The imitation of American machines abroad or their introduc- 


1 Another interesting type of machine was that of Edmund Durrin of Wether- 
field, New York, patented in 1814. The cutting mechanism was of the zig-zag sort 
later employed in our common mowing-machine. 

Apparently there was an unusual amount of “ pirating” in the building of these 
various machines. Certain Wilmington (Delaware) men, advertising a cylindrical 
apparatus, state: they ‘‘are fully aware that the right of patenting has been so 
grossly abused, that to proclaim a new patented invention, is considered by many 
as an annunciation of another method of imposing on the credulity of the public” 
(American Watchman, September 12, 1810). 

2 Pittsfield Sun, October 10, 1810. The machine of Eleazer Hovey was said to 
shear a yard of cloth per minute (Bishop, ii, 176). In 1828, a woolen manufacturer 
of Northampton, Massachusetts, reported that a superintendent and seven girls at- 
tended twenty pair of shears (20th Cong., rst Sess., House Documents, No. 115, p. Qo). 

3 A common form of advertisment for these machines was: “‘price $1oo for the 
narrow machine, and the right to use it at a country stand; for the machine for 
broad cloth, where it runs steadily, $300.” See e. g., Worcester Spy, July 31, 1811 
and Pittsfield Sun, October to, 1810. 


132 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


tion into foreign countries has been pretty definitely traced. For 
example, Dorr’s construction is the basis of a machine patented 
in England by Price nearly twenty-five years later (1815), and, 
according to Doctor Grothe, the first cylindrical machine brought 
out in England. Somewhat later, another machine of the same 
general character was patented by Lewis, of Briscombe, Glou- 
cestershire, by whose name this type of apparatus became known 
most widely in England. A few years earlier, in 1812, a “‘machine 
for shearing cloth with helicoidal shears,” apparently an appa- 
ratus on the Dorr model, was introduced into France by one 
George Bass of Boston, though seemingly the mechanism gained 
little ground until adopted in 1817 by John Collier, the well- 
known French machine builder.! Beriah Swift’s apparatus with 
the oscillating cylinder was dispersed through Europe in a some- 
what similar fashion: Swift’s English agent, one Thomas Miles, 
took out a British patent in his own name; some years later it was 
patented in France by one Nicholson; and subsequently it found 
its way into Germany.” Obviously, then, there can be no question 
that, with respect to this type of wool-manufacturing machinery, 
the United States made a distinct and notable contribution.® 


5. Conclusion. 


The record of the domestic wool manufacture as regards tech- 
nical improvements is a highly creditable one for the period before 
1830,—and beside the advances already discussed there were 


1 Hayes, Bulletin, 1879, p. 43. 

2 Grothe, Bulletin, 1882, p. 13. 

3 In addition, there are statements of foreign writers showing the direct rela- 
tionship. Ure (Philosophy of Manufactures, p. 141) says that the English machine 
similar to that of Dorr’s, which came to be known in England as a “‘lewis,” was 
‘suggested by the sight of an American invention for the same purpose.”’ Like- 
wise, according to Hayes (Bulletin, 1879, p. 43), Alcan, the French textile authority, 
clearly admitted the cylindrical shears to have been of American origin. 

A single, qualified note of discord is struck by Wachs (Die volkwirtschaftliche 
Bedeutung, p. 62), who discriminates between the original idea of the machine, 
which he credits to Dorr, and the practical working-out or application of that idea. 
*‘Dorrs in praktischer Hinsicht noch mangelhafte Maschine,” he says, “‘ wurde dann 
von Stephan Price (1815), John Levis, und William Davis so sehr verbessert, dass 
ihre Apparate bereits alles Grundsa&tzliche der modernen Maschinen, die ihnen 
freilich an Leistungsfihigkeit weit iiberlegen sind, enthalten.” 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 133 


others, notably the warp-dressing, and the cylindrical pressing 
machines.1 Apparently this industry sensed what Tench Coxe 
speaks of as “‘the peculiar value of labor-saving machinery to a 
nation of moderate numbers, dwelling in a country of redundant 
soil.” ? Having received eagerly from England the first fruits of 
British technical advance, namely, the carding machine, the 
picker, and the jenny, this country pushed forward in a multitude 
of directions. And our manufacturers registered successes in 
many lines. As will appear in the sequel, no era in the history of 
the American industry was so prolific of advances from within the 
country as this one prior to 1830. 

Yet despite the extraordinary technological advance of the 
American wool manufacture, it should not be imagined that the 
domestic industry was alone in adding new features to the world’s 
technical equipment. The adaptation in England of the cotton- 
mule construction to wool spinning, though as yet rendered only 
partially automatic, was a notable contribution, being adopted 
in this country as well as abroad some decades later. During 
these years sundry advances appear to have been made in Eng- 
land in the technique of dyeing, and the useful hydraulic press 
was also developed there.*? Likewise, machinery was being 


1 The first is used in a process intermediate between spinning and weaving, a 
process by which yarn already spun is prepared for insertion in the loom as the 
warp threads (or the future longitudinal threads of the woven cloth). The process 
had previously been a purely manual one, and so continued to be in England for 
some years. The American machine was probably an adaptation from a similar 
mechanism already devised in the domestic cotton industry. 

The roller pressing machine was another case of the utilization of the cylinder 
in the wool manufacture, the cloth to be pressed being passed under heavy rollers, 
which were sometimes heated by steam. 

Advance in the fulling apparatus should also be recorded. Levi Osborn (1804) 
and John Dyer (1833) are specially mentioned. The latter is particularly note- 
worthy since he invented the roller type of fulling mill, which was an important 
improvement over the old hammer type (Wachs, op. cit., p. 58; Grothe, in Bulletin, 
1881, p. 60). 

2 State Papers, Finance, ii, 676. 

3 The hydraulic press is a device by which great weight is brought to bear upon 
a relatively small surface. It was invented by Joseph Bramah, an Englishman, in 
1796, was subsequently applied to the wool manufacture, and still is extensively 
employed in the British wool-manufacturing industry. (Wachs, op. cit., p. 63, 
says that the adaptation to use in the textile trades came in America; but I have 


134 THE EKA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


evolved both in England and on the Continent for the fabrica- 
tion of worsted cloths, a branch of the wool manufacture as yet 
practically neglected in the United States. 

Moreover, in contrast to the progress made during this era by 
the domestic cotton industry, that of the wool manufacture ap- 
pears less considerable. The tardiness of most wool-working de- 
velopments is especially striking. Machine carding and power 
spinning, the latter on the water-frames of which knowledge was 
brought to this country by Samuel Slater, were a part of the 
normal cotton-factory equipment by 1800 at least; and the 
general adoption of power weaving for ordinary cotton goods 
anticipated that of similar wool fabrics by something like fifteen 
or twenty years. Of course this situation was duplicated in other 
countries. For instance, in England, just as in the United States, 
the spinning jenny was adopted by the wool manufacture only 
when it was being ousted from the cotton industry. Power weav- 
ing In woolen-goods production in English mills came in much 
more slowly than in the cotton-goods field. Indeed, all along the 
line of advance the contrast between the two developments in 
England is even more disadvantageous to the wool-cloth produc- 
tion. ‘Tardiness of the latter development in both countries is 


seen no indication that this is true, although, to be sure, such presses have long 
been used in this country in greater or less degree.) Whereas in the American 
cylindrical press the cloth is drawn automatically under heavy rollers, in the 
hydraulic apparatus the material must be folded evenly and smoothly to fit into 
the upright chamber of the machine, and the folds must be interlarded with 
paper. Apparently it is this folding and interlarding that has interfered with 
the wider use of the hydraulic device in this country. 

Besides actual machinery, the British made many advances in the methods of 
operation. Cold pressing was in 1813 said by Mease to be coming into use in Eng- 
land (Archives, iii, 345); and many improvements in dyeing are of British origin. 
With respect to the latter feature, one may note the comments not infrequently 
made as to American dyeing. For example, a report to the New York legislature 
in 1826 states: “The colours of American goods are often fugitive, and their tex- 
ture frequently impaired by mordants, which would be prevented by a knowledge 
in the operator or manager of the chemical principles upon which the processes of 
dyeing and colouring are performed.’ And a comparison is then made with the 
superior British methods (New York Senate Journal, 1826, p. 441). See also Bag- 
nall, p. 478; Kettell, in Ezghty Years’ Progress, 1864, p. 301; North, Bulletin, 1902, 
p. 316. Incidentally one may note Tench Coxe’s suggestion, that ‘‘ Dying (sic) 
saves the domestic labor and expense of washing”’ (State Papers, Finance, ii, 679). 


ADVANCE IN TECHNICAL EQUIPMENT 135 


in large measure to be elucidated on the basis of the greater 
difficulty in working the wool fiber. But there are certain ex- 
ceptional circumstances affecting the wool manufacture in the 
United States which influenced the course of events here, and 
of these we should make some particular note. 

In explaining the slowness of technical development in the 
American woolen as compared with the American cotton manu- 
facture, Hayes, speaking with special reference to power spinning 
and weaving, assigned two causes: the fact that there was a 
‘“scarcity of fine wool for merchantable or ‘boughten’ cloth, the 
only kind which then could be advantageously made in a mill, as 
the coarse cloths were all home-made;”’ and the circumstance 
that “‘in the early attempts at spinning (by power) woolen yarn 
adapted for the making of fine fulled cloth, it was found that .. . 
the (spinning) machinery could not be sufficiently controlled to 
preserve the looseness necessary for effectual fulling.” + To some 
extent he was right. Though the scarcity of fine wool as com- 
pared with the ‘“‘abundant supply of cotton” seems a negligible 
or at least secondary cause, the emphasis placed by the early 
manufacturers, and necessarily placed by them, upon the produc- 
tion of ‘‘fine fulled cloth’? was an important deterrent not only 
to the introduction of power-driven apparatus in the factories but 
even to the development of the factories themselves. On the 
other hand, the cotton manufacture both in England and here was 
breaking into a practically untouched field. While there had been 
some importation of Indian cotton fabrics into England and some 
small household production of cotton goods in this country, es- 
pecially in the southern states, the factory development met no 
opposition from or competition with the household (or handicraft) 
industry suchas the organized manufacture of wool cloths encoun- 
tered in both countries. 

This market situation forms the third principal factor bearing 
significantly upon the development of the small factory of 1830. 
Already consideration has been given to the two essential features 
of wool supply and technical advance. Now we may turn to an 
analysis of the conditions in the American market which mili- 


1 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 22. 


136 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


tated against the rise of factory production, — and against the 
adoption of improved technique as well; and to this may be sub- 
joined a description of the manner by which these unfavorable 
conditions were ameliorated.! 


1 Considerable weight has sometimes been given in explaining comparative 
technical development in the United States, to the prohibitions laid by the British 
government on the exportation of textile machinery, plans, or models from England. 
These laws date from 1774 and 1781, and were not wholly repealed until 1845 
(Clark, p. 260; Hayes, Bulletin, 1879, pp. 2-5). It is sometimes said, for example, 
that the woolen branch of the industry was forced to develop new mechanisms by 
virtue of such prohibitions, whereas the worsted branch, being introduced into this 
country after 1845, was under no such compulsion, and accordingly has not made 
any marked technical discoveries. The story of the American worsted manufac- 
ture can wait. It suffices now to point out that as regards the woolen end this 
statement has little real validity. The importations of machinery or the ideas of 
machinery, — the introduction of the carding machine, the picker, and the jenny 
by the Scholfields, or spinning apparatus in the cotton industry by Slater, — are 
only conspicuous cases of what was frequently going on during the whole period of 
restriction on export. For example, other carding machines were brought over or 
erected here without help from the Scholfields (Gould, History of New Ipswich, 
p. 229; North, Bulletin, 1899, pp. 215-216); the flying shuttle was introduced from 
England; and later the Scotch power loom was brought over. The immigration 
into the United States of foreign workmen and mechanics and their employ- 
ment in American mills would serve as means whereby European technique 
would become known here. Furthermore, one cannot examine the contempora- 
neous literature of this period without feeling that there was a considerable inter- 
change of ideas upon processes and apparatus between the older and the younger 
manufacturing centers. In short, the effect of the prohibition on exportation of 
machinery was, to my notion, distinctly minor, if not wholly negligible. 


CHAPTER VII 
THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 


INTRODUCTION 


THE increase in breadth and depth of the domestic market for 
wool fabrics, though for purposes of presentation made the third 
of the chief factors relating to the rise of factory production, is 
undoubtedly the most important of them all. Without the stimu- 
lus given by the public demand for mill-made goods, the spread 
of the fine-wool culture would probably have failed even of such 
moderate success as it did attain, — the “vital impulse”’ would 
have been lacking. Again, the improvement in technical equip- 
ment, as has been frequently demonstrated in other lines, is prin- 
cipally the result of “‘economic necessity,’ — the demand or 
incentive afforded by a thriving industrial organism to better the 
conditions of its existence. Occasionally there are inventions 
which come apparently by chance alone; but they are wholly 
negligible. The importation of devices evolved abroad is in an 
even greater degree the “child of necessity.”’ The extension of 
the domestic cloth market, then, underlying and influencing the 
other factors, deserves specially careful consideration. 

A proper analysis of market conditions in the United States 
over the period from 1760 to 1830 carries one far afield. The 
growth in volume of importations during the earlier decades 
suggests the broadening of the market area, while the course of 
this import movement in the later years gives an indication of 


1 Such a fortuitous invention in the textile field was that of the spinning jenny, 
if one can believe the story usually told of the manner in which Hargreaves chanced 
upon the basic idea (see above, p. 109, note 1). Another case also in the textile do- 
main was the invention of the coach-lace loom by Erastus B. Bigelow. The lace 
commonly used in carriages of his day had always been made by hand; and Bige- 
low’s imaginative mind toyed with the idea of manufacturing it by machine. He 
was at the time (about 1837) a youth, still in his early twenties, and unconnected 
with a manufacturing enterprise. Subsequent application of the principles underly- 
ing this loom to carpet production was, however, the result of business incentive. 


137 


138 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


the efficiency of domestic production. On the other hand, the 
experience of the older household manufacture enables one to 
check conclusions arrived at by other means with respect to the 
rise of factory output. The types of fabrics issuing from the bud- 
ding factories, as well as the types of goods imported, —in so far 
as one can ascertain them both, —throw additional light on the 
character of the market. Then there are the stimulus to dom- 
estic production flowing from patriotic feeling and the more 
tangible support derived from mounting tariff rates, themselves 
in part a reflection of popular sentiment; the fluctuations in 
domestic factory production; and, finally, the changes in the 
cloth-distributive agencies themselves. A full discussion of all 
these features cannot be attempted here. The scope of analysis 
must be limited to indicating the more important elements with 
respect to each subject, at the same time giving proper weight 
to each in proportion as it shows the extent or nature of the 
domestic market. 


1. Importations. 


The case of the Revolutionary War is an excellent one in sup- 
port of the contention sometimes made that political periods are 
not necessarily economic periods. The disturbances to normal 
commercial relations which preceded and accompanied the war 
passed over the country without producing any far-reaching 
economic effects, especially any on the industrial side. Many 
lines of industrial enterprise were in situations approximating 
that of the wool manufacture, i. e., they were lacking the bases 
necessary for real progress, — satisfactory raw material, an ade- 
quate organization, suitable technical equipment, or a beneficent 
public regard for their products. Such conditions combined 
to render this troubled era abortive of enduring industrial 
change. For the domestic wool manufacture, the course of 
events is particularly clear if one follows the movement of 
importations. 

English manufacturers of wool fabrics looked forward to the 
conclusion of peace, confident that it would bring a resumption 
of the trade relations on lines identical with those of the pre-war 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 139 


days. “Let the dispute with America be settled as it may,” 
wrote a pamphleteer in 1782, ‘‘while their wool continues inferior 
to ours, they (the colonists) must from interest, the strongest 
tie of friendship, deal with us (for woolen goods). Interest,’’ 
he adds, “‘is more binding than any treaty of commerce.”! 
Lord Sheffield similarly viewed with complaisance the outcome 
of the conflict, seeing no danger to British trade from mere polit- 
ical separation, and especially no threat to the British wool man- 
ufacture. With the pamphleteer, he fixed upon the most obvious 
difficulty confronting the American wool-manufacturing indus- 
try, that of the wool supply, as the chief deterrent to effective 
competition from this side of the water.? In confirmation of his 
faith in the future, he instanced the perplexities of the Continental 
government in securing clothing for the American army, finally 
having to purchase English cloths in Holland, while at the same 
period the British woolen industry was in excellent condition 
and continued so throughout the war.? In some respects these 
writers were justified in their opinions. As to the wool supply, 
no doubt the sheep in the United States suffered during the 
war, both in numbers by abnormal slaughter of the animals, and 
in quality by an even greater measure of neglect than in peaceful 
years, —a neglect, it may be observed, which continued with 
little correction till after 1800.4 Of more importance, however, 
was the substantial “‘vacuum” in the American wool-cloth sup- 
ply, despite the importations which during the war had filtered 
through from abroad. This lack was particularly felt in the 
towns, which were accustomed to the use of imported fabrics, 
and would find little satisfaction, at least after the first wave 
of patriotic enthusiasm had passed, in the rough home-made 
goods. 

1 Bischoff, i, 234. 

2 Lord Sheffield considered the American wool supply quantitatively inade- 
quate: the wool in the southern ‘“‘provinces,”’ he held, tended to become hairy, 
while in the north the winters were so long and severe that “‘it cannot answer to 
raise many sheep” (Observations, 1784 ed., p. 10). 

co bid. DD. fi- 13. 

4 Wright, pp. 9-10, who accounts for it by the fact that the energies of the new 


country were directed more to other agricultural products and to the carrying 
trade and external commerce. 


PAO, THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


The influx came with the peace. It was not restricted to 
woolens, of course, nor indeed to goods of strictly utilitarian char- 
acter. The statement was made in 1785 that “‘after the peace, 
vast numbers of adventurers, with goods which they were obliged 
to dispose of at all events, flocked here from all quarters,” * until, 
as another contemporary put it, there was “‘an amazing Super- 
fluity of all kinds of European goods.”’* But with the “gew- 
gaws ‘and ballooneries,” the importations of which seemed to 
illustrate the unhappy speculative nature of the movement and 
sorely worried the calmer observers of the period, there was un- 
doubtedly a considerably increased introduction of foreign wool 
fabrics. There are no statistics of such importations for the years 
immediately after the war; but the first ones available, figures of 
British exportations in 1790-1799, suggest what must have been 
the situation during the previous decade. In these later years, 
the shipments from England averaged in value £1,826,000 a year, 
as compared with the shipment already given of £743,000 per 
annum in 1772-1774. Moreover, there was a marked enhance- 
ment during the decade itself, from a figure of £1,488,000 a year 
in 1790-1792 to one of £2,368,000 in 1797-1799.5. When com- 


1 Boston Independent Chronicle, June 16, 1785; quoted in Hill, First Stages of the 
Tariff Policy, p. 65. 

2 Weeden, p. 819, quoting a letter. For other accounts of the period, see Hill; 
op. cit., pp. 64-75, and Appendices I to VI; Giesecke, American Commercial Legis- 
lation before 1789, pp. 126-127. 

3 The allegation is sometimes made in relatively recent writings on the tariff 
that at this time there was an intentional and organized overstocking of the Ameri- 
can market, particularly with wool fabrics. Inasmuch as this alleged plot of Eng- 
lish manufacturers to ‘‘smother” our infant industries was originally stated to 
pertain to a supposed fright in English industrial circles after the publication of 
Hamilton’s Report on Manufactures, its application to the post-Revolutionary 
period is at least inaccurate. Moreover, since the charge was first made some 
twenty years after that event (1816), and since the British wool-manufacturing 
industry was too loosely organized for effective dumping operations, this alle- 
gation probably had no basis in fact. (For the original formulation, see Bishop, 
li, 43.) 

4 Brothers, Wool and Wool Manufactures of Great Britain, p. 144. 

5 The figure £2,368,000 above given is an unadjusted figure. But during the 
decade of the nineties there had been an increase in the general level of prices in 
England amounting to around 33) per cent (Silberling, “ British Prices and Busi- 
ness Cycles, 1779-1850;”’ in Review of Economic Statistics, Supplement, October, 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET I4I 


pared with the growth of population, as nearly as that can be 
estimated, these data are even more significant. They mean an 
enlargement of the per capita consumption of foreign wool fabrics 
— “English”’ being in this connection and at this period nearly 
synonymous with “‘foreign’”’ — from 65d. in 1772-1774 to one of 
85 to god. in 1790-1799.! 

Nor did the up-swing of this movement cease then. For the 
years 1806-1807 exportations from Great Britain averaged as 
much as £4,592,000. This figure, however, is subject to impor- 
tant qualifications. Values in England had risen in consequence 
of monetary inflation, amounting in those years to 15 or 20 per 
cent.2, Moreover, a substantial proportion of these shipments 
was not for our domestic consumption, but for reéxportation to 
the West Indies, since by reason of the existing naval conflict 
of France and England direct shipments thence to the West 
Indian colonies were hazardous. Pitkin estimates this reship- 
ment as a third of our total receipts;* but this appears to me a 
grievous overstatement. Ten or fifteen per cent would seem a 
better figure. Accordingly, while no exact measure of our im- 
ports for consumption in gross or per capita can be made, it is 


1923, p. 232); and on the assumption that woolen prices moved with the general 
movement, adjustment should be made for this change in price levels in order 
that the figure for 1797-1799 should be more closely comparable with that for 
1790-1792. The adjusted figure would be £1,776,000. It is still an increase over 
that for the first years of the decade, but less considerable. 

1 Estimate of population before Revolutionary War taken from Clarke, 
p. 103. In the other cases, census figures for 1790 and 1800 are used. 

2 Silberling, in Review of Economic Statistics, Supplement, October, 1923, p. 232. 

3 Pitkin, Statistical View of the United States, p. 181. 

4 The statistics of reéxports from the United States do not indicate any such 
volume of reshipments as Pitkin estimates. For example, in 1806, the first year in 
which all the necessary figures are available, the real value of woolens exported from 
Great Britain to the United States was £4,894,000; but the value of goods re- 
exported to all countries, which upon their importation had paid a 15 per cent duty, 
— under which woolen cloths would come, — was only $2,076,000, or approximately 
£427,000. To be sure, there was perhaps a large smuggling trade to the West In- 
dies; but on the other hand the value of the British goods reéxported must be in- 
creased by at least 25 per cent to cover the costs of shipment to the United States, 
insurance, and the like. It is doubtful, moreover, if the trade in wool cloths to the 
West Indies with their warmer climate and their large slave populations was con- 
siderable as compared with the trade to the continental American markets. 


142 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


apparent that by this period there had been again an expansion 
of the American market for foreign fabrics. 

The extension of the trade in imported cloths is in part ex- 
plained by the growth in size and wealth of the towns. Accord- 
ing to census estimates, the proportion of population contained 
in communities of eight thousand inhabitants and greater had 
increased rather more rapidly than the total increase of popu- 
lation. In 1790 this proportion had been a thirtieth of the 
country’s people (3.35 per cent), and by 1810 it had become a 
twentieth (4.94 per cent).! Moreover, with the encouragement 
to commerce and shipping which came to American seaboard 
towns as an indirect result of European warfare, there had 
unquestionably been an important accession of wealth. This 
was a heyday of New England commerce, when, for example, 
Salem came to have, it was said, ‘‘a greater per capita wealth 
than any American town.’’? Indeed, the whole northern sea- 
board prospered. 

The considerable extension of the import trade that did take 
place was not possible, I believe, without also some enlargement 
in the geographical basis of the domestic ‘free’? market, — the 
market in which goods appearing in an ordinary commercial 
manner were disposable. Trade in such goods began to reach its 
hands into new regions, particularly into the hinterland of the 
chief import towns, assisted by the development of radiating 
turnpikes, improved roads, and the first of our canal constructions. 
Of Philadelphia, for example, it has been especially pointed out 
that at this time the importers of dry goods had as customers, 
not only the retailers of the city, but also “country storekeepers 
who came in to buy.’’* At the same period there was a marked 
depression in the allied stocking manufacture which had become 
established in many communities lying beyond Philadelphia.* 


1 The population in such communities increased from 131,000 to 357,000, while 
the number of people in the whole country rose from 3,900,000 to 7,200,000 (Weber, 
Growth of Cities, p. 22). 

* Morison, Maritime History of Massachusetts, p. 122. 

3 Hazard’s Register of Pennsylvania, ii, 262; an article by “‘ Lang Syne.” 

4 Janson, Stranger in America, 1807, p. 195; Essay on the Manufacturing Interest 
tn the United States, 1804, p. 28. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 143 


In Middletown, Connecticut, a wholesale importing house for 
English fabrics, especially fine woolen cloth, was set up in 1804, 
to supply the interior of that state! In addition, there were, it 
seems, the beginnings of a trade with the newly settled West. 
Thomas Ashe, a traveler writing in 1806, states: ‘‘The chief 
business of the town and state (Lexington, Kentucky) . . . con- 
sists of ordering immense quantities of goods from Philadelphia 
and Baltimore, and in bartering the same through the State for 
produce (which is shipped to New Orleans by water). The goods 
are all British . . . and the merchants of Lexington not only 
supply their own State, but that of Tennessee . . . and part of 
the Indian territory which lies to the North.””? Probably Ashe’s 
account should be taken only with a liberal discount; and I 
would not exaggerate the movement at this period. But the 
evidence does suggest that the market for wool fabrics was widen- 
ing perceptibly during the thirty-odd years, 1774 to 1807. 

Apparently there had also been a broadening of the market; 
that is, the range of quality in the goods it would consume had 
increased, —although here the data are too scant for satisfactory 
determination. In the testimony of merchants before a Parlia- 
mentary committee in 1811 there is mention of a wider variety 
of fabrics shipped to the United States than appears in colonial 
accounts. ‘To the southern states were sent negro blankets, 
“‘plains,”’ and the lower grades of wool cloths, while to the north- 
ern states, besides the customary broadcloth, came a group of new 
fabrics, cassimeres, kerseymeres, flannels, and the like, cloths 
which might be called of medium quality.® 

For the present consideration, the most important point is that 
the enlargement of the domestic market for imported fabrics, — 
in part derived, it seems, through an encroachment upon the old 
household production,—presented an opportunity to a domestic 
factory manufacture. The widening of the market in quality 
was another favorable feature, since a young domestic industry 
could not at once attain the skill in manufacture necessary to 


1 Middlesex Gazette, March g, 1804. 
? Ashe, Travels in America, 1806, p. 193. 
3 British Documents, 1812 [210], passim. 


144 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


compete with the older foreign industries in the production of 
the finest cloths. Probably, moreover, an American manufacture 
upon a factory basis could not arise unaided in the face of foreign 
importations, or at least such a development could not come 
without a long period of struggle. With a decided change in com- 
petitive conditions, due to natural or artificial causes, domestic 
enterprises would then find a considerable market awaiting their 
products. 

The opportunity for the domestic manufacture came with the 
commercial disturbances which accompanied the embargo and 
non-intercourse acts and the War of 1812, and the effect of 
these events was supplemented by that of the tariff in which the 
rates on wool goods had been gradually creeping up. To be 
sure, there was not a complete cessation of importations into the 
United States. The governmental regulations themselves were 
not all-inclusive. The non-importation act of 1806 exempted 
‘woolen cloth whose invoice prices shall not exceed five shillings 
sterling per square yard;’’ and the embargo of February, 1808, 
offered similar treatment to cassimeres of the same low values, 
together with shalloons and woolen stuffs,—such exemptions, it 
seems tome, being a commentary on the importance of “‘boughten”’ 
cloth to certain sections of the domestic market. Again, the reg- 
ulations were not always in force, as national policy was some- 
what vacillating; and when in force, they were not always 
observed. Finally, for the war period, a considerable avenue 
for importation existed through New England, the coast of 
which was not blockaded during the first part of the conflict.” 

Yet such modifications do not affect the essentials of the prop- 
osition that embargo, non-intercourse, and war meant oppor- 
tunity for the domestic wool manufacture. Importations from 
Great Britain fell in 1808 to £1,995 ,ooo froma figure of £4,289,000 


1 The special consideration for the cheaper goods, largely used in the South, 
makes one suspicious that the Republican or Anti-Federalist party of those days 
was not above “‘playing politics”’; or perhaps this is merely the beginning of the 
practice subsequently followed with respect to some wool goods, e. g., flannels 
and blankets, of giving special consideration, as by lower import duties, to 
fabrics in large demand among the poorer classes. 

2 See Morison, Maritime History of Massachusetts, pp. 205-206. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 145 


for the previous year.' The testimony of British manufacturers 
and merchants themselves indicates that there were lean periods 
in their exportations to America: 1808 was a bad year for ship- 
ments, 1809 was somewhat better, and while 1810 was good, 1811 
was again poor.” Finally, one may note the advertisements of 
English textiles which appeared not infrequently during these 
and the war years under the caption of “‘Scarce Goods.” * These 
deficiencies and irregularities of foreign supply, then, were the 
foundation, slender indeed but adequate, upon which the first 
real boom in the domestic factory production of wool fabrics was 
grounded. 

After the war came peace; or, in terms applicable to woolen- 
goods history, after the brief heyday afforded American manufac- 
turers by the abnormal circumstances of 1806-1815 came a flood 
of goods, even as after the Revolutionary War. Exportations of 
wool fabrics from England to the United States again reached a 
figure of £4,200,000 during the calendar year 1815, and in the 
succeeding three years, too, averaged over £2,690,000.* Just how 
serious this movement was in itself is uncertain: the indirect 
trade, through the United States to the West Indies, was prob- 
ably now a negligible quantity, but there was at this time still a 
considerable inflation of values in England due to the monetary 
conditions.® Perhaps, however, the prices of wool goods, by rea- 
son of some improvements in technique of manufacture, had not 
risen so high as the general level of prices. One cannot surely 
judge the resultant of these forces. At least it is evident that 
taking into account the new factor in the situation, the expanded 
factory production in the United States, the influx of an unusually 
large quantity of foreign woolens was a momentous affair. There 

1 Pitkin, op. cit., p. 294. 

2 British Documents, 1812, [210], especially pp. 127, 205, 210, 214, and 244. 
As to 1812, Niles speaking of English goods in general said that there was ‘“‘a very 
great supply” with ‘‘additional ship loads daily arriving”? (iii, 110). 

3 For example, see Middlesex Gazette, April 11, 1811. 

4 These figures exclude a small value of carpets. 

5 Prices in England moved from roo in 1790 to 156 in 1799, 152-166 in 1806- 
1808, and in 1815 were at 166. During the next three years, 1816-1818, 


they averaged 143 (Silberling, Review of Economic Statistics, October, 1923, p. 
232). 


146 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


had been some basis of actuality for Niles’s proud exclamation in 
1814, after stating that for two years the country had been 
largely self-dependent for wool goods: ‘‘Has any real want been 
experienced? ’?! The enlarged domestic production, mainly upon 
the factory system, had in a marked degree filled in the area pre- 
viously controlled by the importations. But the domestic market 
was neither broad nor deep enough to absorb easily a suddenly 
much-enhanced supply of wool fabrics. Some of the conse- 
quences flowing from this situation will engage our attention 
later.? | 

The crisis of 1818-1819 brought to an end the post-war specu- 
lative movement, with which the large cloth importations of the 
period apparently were connected.* The tariff was retained at 
the moderately protective level instituted by the act of 1816; 
and the projected decrease in rates that had been specified by 
that act to occur three years later was canceled. But, perhaps 
more important than these other factors, the domestic industry 


1 Niles, vii, 275. 

2 It is interesting to note incidentally that after the War of 1812 there was in 
English manufacturing circles none of the complacency which had characterized 
the British opinion subsequent to the Revolutionary War, e. g., Lord Sheffield’s 
utterances. Instead there was evident worry in the minds of British manufacturers, 
to be seen in their testimony before Parliamentary committees. An extreme ex- 
pression of this attitude, and one that long stuck in the minds of American protec- 
tionists, was made by Mr., later Lord, Brougham on the floor of Parliament: ‘‘It is 
worth while to incur a loss upon the first exportation, in order, by the glut, to stifle 
in the cradle those rising manufactures in the United States, which the war has 
forced into existence, contrary to the natural course of things”’ (Niles, xi, 284). 

For further discussion of the effects of these importations, see below, pp. 
161-164, 182-183, 249, and Chap. IX, passim. 

3 The relationship between the heavy importations of the years 1816-1818 and 
the boom which was then affecting the business of the country, is evident in the 
literature of the period. For example, a “‘rage for shopkeeping”’ is noted by one 
writer (Niles, ix, 350), in which men set up stores with unreasoning profusion, 
abetted by the “‘litter of banks” that had sprung up in many parts of the nation. 
The purpose of these stores was largely the sale of imported goods, among which 
woolen cloths were a prominent feature. A traveler in the western country found 
even there an extraordinary array of English products: at Pittsburgh the dry goods 
and grocery stores were ‘“‘literally stuffed” with goods of English manufacture; at 
Natchez three-fourths of the stock of every store was so constituted; and at Cin- 
cinnati the main street had such a supply as to resemble Cheapside. The writer 
remarks: ‘‘Shopkeeping has been very profitable, but it certainly is now very much 
overdone” (Fearon, Travels, pp. 208, 234, 271). 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 147 


underwent severe readjustment. The methods and aims of the 
young manufacture, — a manufacture which had some features 
of a mushroom growth, — were overhauled and made to fit 
more effectively with the existing peace conditions of interna- 
tional competition.’ Asa result of all these various factors, im- 
portations decreased in both value and quantity. From the 
average value of £2,690,000 in the years 1816-1818, British 
exportations of wool fabrics to the United States fell during 
the next decade to an average of only £1,074,000 in 1828-1830.” 
As to quantity: whereas in the earlier years there had been 
an exportation of 509,000 pieces and 3,948,000 yards of goods, — 
some fabrics being measured in the one and some in the other 
manner, — by the turn of the decade (calendar years 1828-1831) 
these figures had declined to 465,000 and 1,682,000, respec- 
tively. Inasmuch as these statistics include worsted stuff goods, 
—as yet not directly competitive with our factory manufac- 
tures, — the relief to the domestic woolen manufacture was in- 
deed greater than these group figures show.* The early years 
in the thirties showed some reaction from this downward trend, 
but not until the boom years just prior to the crisis of 1837 did 
importations return to a level comparable with the former one 
(1815-1819). And even when they did return to such a level, the 
country was so prosperous and so much more populous that 
the enhanced supplies were accepted without complaint from 
the domestic manufacturers.* During the same period, it may 
be added, there was an even greater decline in the per capita con- 


1 For tariff history, see below, pp. 163 ff.; and for reform of the domestic in- 
dustry, see below, pp. 195 ff. 

2 Exclusive of worsted stuff goods, which did not compete directly with the do- 
mestic woolen manufactures, the figures are: for the period 1816-1818, £2,400,000; 
and for the years 1828-1830, £664,000. All figures here and in the text are, ap- 
proximately, for calendar years. The British data pertain to years ending Jan- 
uary 5. So the official year of, say, 1818, I have called equivalent to the calendar 
year 1817. 

3 Exclusive of worsted stuff fabrics, the quantity of pieces in the two periods 
(worsted stuffs being measured in terms of pieces) would be, respectively, 240,000 
and 129,000. 

4 During the next decade the course of gross imports, — exclusive of carpets, 
worsteds, hosiery, and clothing, — was as follows by fiscal years: 


148 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


sumption of imported wool-manufactures. By the years 1822- 
1824 this average had reached 85 cents, and at the end of the 
decade it had sunk still lower, to 57 cents per capita.’ 

In this movement it is probable that certain general causes 
were operative. For instance, during the years 1819-1824 the 
British wool manufacture was seriously burdened by a duty on 
its raw material. From a rate of 5s. 3d. per hundred weight in 
1802 and 6s. 8d. in 1813, the duty was in 1819 pushed up by the 
Conservative reaction which followed the Napoleonic wars, to 
56s. per hundred weight, or 6d. per pound. Inasmuch as Spanish 
and German wools played an important réle in the production of 
the finer English cloths, this increase of rate was significant. The 
years until 1824, one may note, were just those in which the 
American industry was getting upon its feet again and begin- 
ning its more healthful advance. 

Again, the fact is well known that in the early twenties the in- 
terest of the British traders generally was in the newly expanded 
South American market, and to some extent British woolen mer- 
chants participated in this new adventure. At the turn of the 
decade, the calendar years 1819-1821, the average annual ship- 
ments of wool goods to the principal South American states had 
been only £360,000 in value; but in the calendar years 1823- 
1825 the trade had reached a value of £685,000 per year, and in 
the single year 1825, one of £836,000. The effects had become 
evident in America toward the end of this movement. Niles 
spoke in 1825 of the great and sudden rise in the price of British 
goods in the United States, ‘“‘caused by the immense supplies that 
have been sent off or ordered for Mexico and South America.”’ 


In terms of thousands of dollars 


T8260. Pl ah eae $6554 1833 :/. (ee $8062 
coy mR By Le SONG. Fs 6471 1834:| 43 eee 5837 
TO25 96. loses ea, 6286 1833) ap Wee eee eee 9636 
TOO sd; bot Sie sd cree ee 4727 1836 2. 5 12,345 
TOAOV 2d caee Gaeaeeee 4068 1837 4a 4148 
PRZT YW ite wis lesb ae ee 8950 1838 . 3. {ou eee 6556 
TOS 2 ee ele ae eee 6886 


1 Clark, p. 609. These figures include all wool goods imported, even carpets. 
2 Parliamentary Papers, 1826-1827 [532]. The countries included in the above 
figures are Brazil, Mexico and Guatemala, Columbia, Peru, Chile, and Argentina. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 149 


Curiously enough for Niles, the ardent protectionist, he com- 
ments: that this situation ‘“‘will do many times more for our 
manufactories than the tariff accomplished. . . . If this state of 
things continues for two or three years, the industry of the people 
will protect itself.” ' A year or two later, though the crisis of 
1825 in England had somewhat disabused British traders, com- 
ment is still made of ‘‘ the madness in England to make shipments 
to South America,” and its effect on prices in this country.’ 
Moreover, that region could still be spoken of at a Parliamen- 
tary inquiry as ‘‘a wonderful market” which was “becoming 
more steady.”’* Though shipments to these chief South American 
countries never reached a value half that of shipments to the 
United States, still the psychological influence and a substantial, 
purely business incentive effected a diversion of interest from our 
trade and thus gave an additional impetus to domestic produc- 
tion. 

More important than these factors, it seems, in influencing the 
general trade movement was the series of changes within the do- 
mestic industry itself, — the improvement in technical equip- 
ment, the change in the character of the domestic output, the 
accumulation of capital, and the like, features which have been 
or will shortly be considered. It was these more fundamental 
and enduring changes which made possible the subsequent de- 
velopment of the manufacture. Even the tariff cannot compare 
with these internal adjustments in laying the foundation for the 
young industry. To be sure, protection tempered the wind to 
the struggling manufacture and compensated it for the tax upon 
the raw material; but the course of importations under these 
early tariffs, irregular and uncertain, suggests that at best such 
protection was of only secondary value.* The influence of these 
internal factors is well evidenced by a closer survey of the course of 
importations, an examination into importation by types of fabrics. 

A glance at the accompanying diagrams is sufficient to suggest 


1 Niles, xxviii, 84. He is speaking of commodities in general, but specifically 
mentions “cottons, woolens, and hardware.” 

Sei Dtd 2, SXX1, 227, 

3 Parliamentary Papers, 1828 [515], p. 207. 

4 See table, above, pp. 147-148, note 4. 


I50 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


the variation in the experience of the several fabrics.! It is evi- 
dent that in the case of “cloths,” chiefly broadcloths, im- 
portations struck a rather constant figure after the decline in 


Thousands of Pieces 


Stuffs 
Kerseymeres: 





815 1820 1825 1830 1835 


Fic. 4. Exportation of Cloths, Stuff-goods, and Kerseymeres from the 
United Kingdom to the United States, 1815-1834. 


1816-1820, though to be sure with a slightly downward tendency 
until the lift in the thirties. This situation indicates that with 
regard to this particular commodity the American manufacture 
was only partially successful in meeting the foreign competition 
and satisfying the domestic requirements: there was still a fairly 


1 These diagrams are based on statistics of English exportations to the United 
States. There are no American (import) figures upon quantity in this early period, 
and the categories of the statistics of value are not as numerous as those of the 
British data on quantity. To be sure, the proportion of British goods to the total 
volume of wool fabrics imported into the United States tended to decline during 
the decade of the twenties, although, on account of difficulties in comparing British 
(export) figures with American (import) data, one cannot be sure by what degree 
such decrease occurred. Yet British exports probably formed 80 to 85 per cent of 
our imports. And so one is not much in error to speak of “‘importations”’ as equiv- 
alent to “British exportations to the United States,’’ as I have in the text. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET I51 


steady demand for foreign goods; while the dip downwards sug- 
gests a gradually strengthening position of domestic mills as their 
processes improved and their costs declined. 

With respect to this finer fabric, there is additional evidence 
of the lack on the part of American producers of real competitive 
power. During the period under consideration there was a 
marked change in the position of the fine-cloth manufacture. 
From a place of dominance among factory products, it fell until 
several fabrics, notably satinets, flannels, and negro cloths, were 
of larger and more general production.! Again, there is sugges- 
tion in the fact that the broadcloth manufacturers were the men 
prominent in the affairs of the Harrisburg Convention and in the 
hearings of the Committee on Manufactures in 1828, both these 
proceedings being concerned with higher tariff protection. They 
_ set the tone of these hearings, as when one of them remarked that 
“the best investments in broadcloth manufactures in the country 
are not worth over 50 cents on the dollar.” * Moreover, testimony 
from England is available. For instance, a manufacturer as- 
serted before a Parliamentary committee in the same year, 1828: 
“We send (superfine cloths) very largely to the United States; 
they (the Americans) will have great difficulty in interfering with 
any of our cloths that are worth more than t1os. a yard; I do not 
think they can manufacture them.” It seems, accordingly, that 
broadcloth was an article in the production of which Americans 
were under a comparative disadvantage, an article the manufac- 
ture of which did not fit into American economic conditions, —at 
least American economic conditions of that date. Because of 
the better workmanship and other advantages of the British 
manufacturer, importations could continue despite natural and 
artificial protection to American production. 

A somewhat similar situation as regards importations is ap- 


1 See below, Chap. IX, passim. 

2 State Papers, Finance, v, 827. Out of fourteen men who testified before the 
Committee on Manufactures, all but three indicated an interest in the production 
of broadcloth. For the Harrisburg Convention and the Act of 1828, see below, 
pp. 168-171. 

3 Parliamentary Papers, 1828 [515], p. 295 (or Journal of the House of Lords, \x, 
1828, Appendix 3, p. 886). 


152 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


parent in the case of blankets, though here the downward inclina- 
tion of imports remarked in connection with broadcloths is less 
decided. Blankets were a type of fabric in the production of 
which American mills were not sufficiently successful to be able 
to drive out foreign goods. At most the American industry could 


Thousands of yards 


eae Flannel 


awe Blankets 





1815 1820 1825 1830 1835 
Fic. 5. Exportation of Blankets and Flannels from the United Kingdom 


to the United States, 1815-1834. 

only prevent an increase in volume of importations commensurate 
with the growth in population. While explanation of the tardi- 
ness in the development of blanket production is difficult, and 
probably lies chiefly in lack of proper technical equipment, suf- 
ficiently broad power looms, or in the less considerable protec- 
tion accorded this article by the tariff laws, it 1s at least plain 
that, as an Englishman explained in 1828, “‘blankets are an article 
they (the Americans) have not got on so fast in the manu- 
facture of.’’! 

Worsted stuff-goods are a third commodity of which the im- 
portation seems indifferently affected by affairs in America, 
whether industrial expansion or the tariff. Here, however, the 
solution is simple. There had as yet been no real development of 

1 Parliamentary Papers, 1828 [515], p. 214 (or Journal of the House of Lords, \x, 


1828, Appendix 3, p. 847). See discussion of American blanket manufacture 
below, pp. 202-204. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 153 


the worsted manufacture in this country. Some handicraft pro- 
duction of worsted fabrics seems to have persisted, at least for a 
. time,on lines of the earlier colonial methods, though the evidence 
is scant. At any rate, the factory production was negligible. 
Two attempts at factory manufacture had been made around 
1820 in Rhode Island, one of them, the Pawtucket Worsted 
Company, formed for the production of fine vestings. Again, a 
mill at Dedham, Massachusetts, issaid to have turned out worsted 
yarns for some years after 1822. And a few mills are reported as 
turning out small quantities of worsted fabrics in 1832.1 How- 
ever, thirty years were yet to elapse before the worsted manu- 
facture could be said to be established in this country. Moreover, 
it may be noted again that, as suggested already, the types of 
worsted fabrics imported were for the most part not directly com- 
petitive with American wool manufactures. The chief group was 
that of worsted dress-goods for women’s wear, a sort of article 
entirely different from the flannel, linsey-woolsey, or homespun 
which had been used for that purpose theretofore and which still 
supplied an important part of the demand for women’s garments. 
Accordingly, the continued importation of-worsted fabrics, with 
the rather wide fluctuations in that movement, are really of but 
secondary value in estimating the position of the American wool- 
manufacturing industry. 

The course of importation in the case of the other fabrics, as 
shown in the diagrams above, is of special significance. More- 
over, what is presented as occurring in the import movement of 
flannels and kerseymeres, holds true for other categories item- 
ized in available statistics: coatings, baizes, and to a less extent 
‘‘woolens mixed with cotton, linen, etc.’’ These fabrics had in 
a degree a common character: they were of lower grade than 
the lordly broadcloth, did not require so great skill in their pro- 
duction, and appealed to a clientéle less exacting and less affected 
by style. The most important and most spectacular case is that 
of flannels. Exportation from England had amounted to over 
5,000,000 yards in the calendar year 1815, and had averaged 


1 Clark, p. 573; Field, State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, iii, 363; 
McLane’s Report, i, 379; Bishop, ii, 361. 


154 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


2,285,000 yards for the next three years. But thereafter the 
outward movement to the United States fell until in the five 
years 1828-1832 it was only a tenth of the latter figure, —only 
228,000 yards. Nor was there an appreciable reaction in the 
thirties when the general course of woolen imports was upward.! 
The rather precipitant decline of flannel importations, especially 
in the twenties, at a time when American production, as will be 
shown, was mounting steadily, together with the failure of the 
movement to recover substantially in the thirties, indicates that 
unquestionably with respect to this article American manufac- 
turers had command of the domestic market. That flannel and 
in only less degree the other fabrics mentioned above were types 
of cloth easily manufactured, —requiring little technical skill, — 
and enjoying a wide, popular demand, suggests the lines upon 
which the American wool manufacture had found it more 
advantageous to proceed. 

In brief, the volume of importations, which had risen prior to 
the embargo and war period and which had indeed been harm- 
fully great after the war, tended to decline substantially in the 
decade of the twenties. Reaction to a higher level of importa- 
tions was, it is true, destined to occur in the next decade, when 
the speculative boom of that period offered a peculiarly easy 
market for foreign goods. But the level thus subsequently 
reached was by no means so significant to the young domestic 
wool manufacture as the import movement of the early post-war 
years had been. Apparently, on the whole the American in- 
dustry was gathering competitive strength and was finding it 
possible to supply an ever greater proportion of the domestic de- 
mands for wool fabrics. In this movement, however, certain lines 
or classes of cloths experienced much more decisive changes in 
status than did others,—a feature of the situation fully as im- 


1 It is noteworthy that the only manufacturer who before the Committee on 
Manufactures in 1828 admitted passable conditions in the wool-working industry 
was also the only flannel manufacturer, Abraham Marland (State Papers, Finance, 
v, 818). - 

The tariff of 1828 was an important factor in accounting for the particularly low 
figures of flannel importations in 1828-1832; but as will be shown below (pp. 204- 
206), the tariff at best merely expedited a change which was already started. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 155 


portant to note as the general course. For example, the domestic 
manufacture of flannels tended rapidly to increase, while the im- 
portations of that fabric declined in a steady fashion. Again, the 
production of satinets, never much disturbed by competition 
from abroad, grew in volume until it supplied an important sec- 
tion of the American demand for wool goods. On the other hand, 
the domestic broadcloth manufacture decreased as unfavorable 
conditions supervened, while imports of this fabric persisted at 
a substantial and a fairly even figure. In this divergent experi- 
ence, finally, one should note that the character of the goods 
whose importations tended definitely to decline corresponded 
closely with that type which knowledge of American conditions 
would lead us to believe most advantageous for domestic mills 
to produce. These were goods of medium quality, free of any 
considerable style influence, and subject to a large domestic de- 
mand. Already the dominant economic forces of the country 
were beginning to mold the wool manufacture in the form which 
was to characterize so many American industries. 


The Organization of the Import Trade. 


Disturbance to the American wool-manufacturing industry 
arose not only by reason of the amount or variation in the amount 
of goods imported but also of the method of their distribution 
within the country. It is noteworthy, too, that the method of 
distribution for imported fabrics had by 1830 become on the 
whole less satisfactory from the viewpoint of the domestic manu- 
facturer than the method employed in the early days of domes- 
tic factory production,—in this respect contrasting with what 
we shall find was the case with the distribution of American- 
made goods. A fairly orderly method of sale for domestic cloths 
had been arising despite the influence of the auction system, but 
dealings in imported goods continued to be characterized chiefly 
by instability and uncertainty. 

Subsequent to the colonial period, when goods were “‘ generally 
sent (to America) at the risk of the shop-keepers and traders of 
England,” 1 there had been a considerable growth in the number 

1 Gee, Trade and Commerce of Great Britain Considered, p. 171. 


156 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


and importance of American importing houses. While the rep- 
resentatives of foreign exporters did not by any means disappear, 
the trade seems, before the outbreak of the War of 1812, to have 
drifted largely into the hands of resident American merchants. 
This period was, we may recall, one of great commercial expan- 
sion in the United States, when our merchants were willing, as 
it were, to fish in troubled waters. After the close of that war, 
conditions within the United States changed to the detriment of 
these importing concerns of domestic origin. 

Chief among the unfavorable factors were the dumping, in the 
immediate post-war years, of stocks previously accumulated by 
British merchants, and the development of the auction system of 
sale. The importation of woolens in 1815 and 1816 had been 
accompanied by the invasion of ‘‘adventurers,” seemingly men 
dispatched by English merchants to expedite the sale of the 
surplus stocks. This was the beginning apparently of the ‘‘for- 
elgn agent”? system which aroused so much complaint in later 
years. Evidently, too, the auction sale came then for the first 
time into prominencé, employed at that time for the quick dis- 
tribution of these surplus goods. The joint action of these 
two factors, heavy importations and the sales system, is evi- 
dent in the contemporaneous comment of a traveler: ‘Both 
here (Philadelphia) and at New York, I have seen British 
goods sold this way (by auction) for less than they cost in Eng- 
land; I hardly recollect seeing them sell for more.” ? 

As time went on, the practice of sale on “‘foreign account” and 
that of auction sales became more firmly fixed in the distribu- 
tion of foreign goods, these two methods tending also to give 
strength to one another. In Baltimore, said Niles in 1828, there 
was hardly one large importing house; but a dozen would be 
established were this desolating system (agents and auctions) re- 
strained as it should be.” Mr. Mallary spoke even more emphat- 
ically, and with particular reference to the woolen import trade. 
Before the war, he said, this business was almost exclusively in 
the hands of our own merchants. The number in Boston, New 


1 Palmer, Travels, p. 257. See also Carey, Crisis, pp. 34-35. 
*; Niles. Xxxv. (241, 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 157 


York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore was about one hundred and 
sixty. Now (1830) there were but about twenty. ‘As I am in- 
formed by a most intelligent merchant, there were in New York 
at the period to which I have alluded, forty-three, whom he recol- 
lects; now only five. One of the appraisers recently informed me 
that there were at least six! ’’! Meanwhile, the auction sale had 
grown in prominence with respect to imported goods. Indeed, the 
utilization of this method for imported textiles seems to have 
reached its height around 1830. Statistics of foreign dry goods 
sold at auction in New York City indicate a hundred per cent in- 
crease in the value of such stuffs sold between 1818-1820 and 
1827-1829: from $6,567,000 to $12,426,000.” Then, too, the wave 
of agitation against the “‘auction system,” as reflected in the con- 
temporary literature, with the insistent demand for control and 
suppression by taxation or otherwise, reached its greatest inten- 
sity around 1830, suggesting that at that time the effects of the 
system were most deleterious. The intensity of the domestic 
feeling in these years is evident in a memorial from “Sundry 
Merchants, &c. of New York City:” ‘Of all the evils with which 
the American Merchants, manufacturers, and tradesmen have to 
contend, in their competition with foreign capital, skill, and en- 
terprise, there is none, perhaps, of equal magnitude, or fraught 
with consequences so ruinous and demoralizing, as those which 
flow from the present pernicious system of selling goods at auc- 
tion. The numerous evils of this system have grown with its 
growth; and strengthened with its strength; its paralyzing in- 

1 Congressional Debates, 21st Cong., 1st Sess., p. 800. 

Mr. Mallary continues: in most of our cities, especially in New York, woolen 
cloths are generally sold on foreign account,—‘“‘as far as I can ascertain, four-fifths; 
many suppose nine-tenths.” Even Gallatin in his Free Trade Memorial indicates 
the same situation, though he does not go back so far: ‘‘The importations from 
England were, before the tariff of 1828, about equally divided between the Ameri- 
can importer and the British manufacturer, who, though the whole amount of the 
woolen branch is curtailed, engrosses now more than two-thirds of what is still 
imported” (Taussig, State Papers, p. 194). See also Report of the Convention of the 
Friends of Domestic Industry: ‘Your committee (on evasions) are informed, and 
believe. that four-fifths of all the importations of dry goods into this port (New 
York) are on foreign account; and in the particular branch of woolen cloths, seven- 


eighths of the whole amount are thus imported” (p. 33). 
2 New York Documents, Report of the Comptroller, 1843, pp. 130-131. 


158 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


fluence is felt in almost every branch of business, and by every 
class of the community.” ! } 

The two phenomena, sales on foreign account and sales by 
auction, as already suggested, were directly connected. The sale 
by foreign exporters through agents located in this country per- 
mitted the importation of goods at somewhat lower prices than 
if they had been sold to domestic merchants. Intermediate 
profits, those required by the foreign exporting merchant, were 
wholly or partly eliminated; goods invoiced at cost of production 
bore lower import duties; and the stocks of these foreign dealers 
could be carried at lower rates of interest.2, Some such advan- 
tages, to be sure, have always favored the foreign-agent system, 
but in that period, particularly with slower turnover and 
presumably higher rates of profit, the advantage was probably 
greater than in more recent times. Again, the agent, as well as 
the domestic merchant, could take advantage of the credit on 
import duties extended by the government. Moreover, the sale 
through agents permitted fraudulent entry of values, a practice 
which was to some extent incited by the system of minimum valu- 
ations begun in the tariff of 1824 and expanded in that of 1828. 
The constant allegation of fraud at the period, too, intimates that 
the opportunity was not neglected nor the incitement (of the 
minima) wholly resisted. But the possibility of ready sale by 
auction was the foreign manufacturer’s or merchant’s greatest 
asset. No elaborate office was necessary, and storage facilities 
were reduced to a minimum. There was no need of advertising, 
nor attempt to maintain cordial relations with particular domes- 
tic purchasers. Furthermore, the auctions provided means of an 
immediate sale. At first, to be sure, it was the practice of im- 
porters generally to extend credit of three, six, and even nine 
months to purchasers, but the note of the purchaser was discount- 
able at the banks.* Later, when the auction system was more 

1 78th Cong., 1st Sess., Executive Reports, No. 22. 

2 The foreign agent was frequently said to have an advantage over the 
regular domestic importer of 714 to 1o per cent,—whatever that may mean 
exactly. 


3 For practice of credit extension: State Papers, Finance, ili, 585; Holmes, Ac- 
count of the United States, p. 210. The custom of purchasers’ endorsing one 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 159 


firmly established, the auctioneer came to occupy a more impor- 
tant position, and one more favorable to the foreign agent. In 
1829, it was said to be the general practice, not only for the for- 
eign agents to hand over their invoices and to endorse their bills 
of lading to the auctioneer, leaving him to enter their goods at the 
customs house and to give bond for the duties, but also for 
the auctioneer to make advances upon the goods thus placed 
under his control. An amount equal to two-thirds the value of 
the goods was at once advanced, and the balance was paid over 
upon actual sale. On the side of internal distribution, too, the 
auctioneer had acquired obligations, especially that of endorsing 
the notes of purchasers. Under such conditions, obviously, 
neither the position of the foreign agent nor that of his principal 
was a particularly arduous one. 

To contemporaries, the operation of this general system seemed 
to savor of what we now designate as dumping. For example, 
the Woolen Circular in 1826 stated that Europeans ‘‘export the 
surplus of their fabrics to this country, leaving their home-market 
free from an excess of goods, and producing a glut in our markets, 
which paralyzes the exertions of our manufacturers.” But the 
practice was too common and continuous to be properly desig- 
nated “‘dumping.”*? The fact that, as we shall see, the auction 
was also employed to a considerable extent by domestic manu- 
facturers themselves, suggests that that portion of the system did 
in some measure fit into the market conditions of the period, 
featured as they were by the lack of a well-organized distributive 
system in a steadily expanding trade. Perhaps, in fact, the evils 


another’s notes, is said by Holmes to have induced over-speculation: ‘“‘a sort of 
chain, or house of cards was formed ...so that when one man failed, several 
others went down too.” 

1 New York Assembly Journal, 1829, p. 392; Niles, xlv, 395, quoting from the 
London Spectator. The general result is stated thus in the latter account: ‘So 
that it has repeatedly happened that bills for two-thirds of the value of the 
goods exported have been on their way back to England, before the goods them- 
selves have been landed, or the necessary papers passed through the customs 
house.” 

2 Niles, xxxi, 201. 

3 More accurately, the foreign export trade was not organized in a manner — 
monopolistic or quasi-monopolistic—to induce profitable long-run dumping; 


160 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


of the system were not quite so great as its critics alleged. With 
the wide utilization of auctions as a means of distribution, agents 
or auctioneers would perhaps be inclined to hold goods from the - 
block, at least in times of ordinary good business, until a fairly 
satisfactory sale was in prospect. Especially if the auctioneer 
had made advances on the goods, he would not heedlessly over- 
stock or oversell the market. 

Still the agent-auction system at best was not a factor favor- 
able to the domestic production of woolen goods. It made for- 
eign competition more severe and more quickly felt than would 
otherwise have been the case. The chief effects were perhaps 
three in number. This system would tend to make more pro- 
nounced the normal fluctuations in business, especially if in- 
dustry in England happened to be simultaneously depressed. 
More goods might besent to the American market than would ap- 
pear if domestic merchants were importing “‘on their own;”’ and 
auction sales might put these goods more rapidly into distribution. 
Again, the way to fraudulent dealings in importations was made 
particularly easy; and the evidence adduced in the courts and in 
the literature of the period indicates that frauds were not infre- 
quent or trivial. And, finally, the development of a better dis- 
tributivesystem in the sale of woolen clothwas impeded. Jobbers 
and even retailers could make purchases at the auction sales; 
and under such circumstances orderliness in selling arrangements 
was rendered difficult. In short, then, the peculiar situation with 
respect to the marketing of foreign wool fabrics that arose in 
the period before 1830 was of much import to American wool 
manufacturers, affecting both the industrial and commercial 
aspects of their business. 


2. Public Encouragement to the Domestic Manufacture. 


The difficulties in which the American nation found itself in 
the years preceding the second war with England —a rude 
awakening from the dream of independence and isolation — in- 
duced a recrudescence of that desire for economic self-dependence 


while the phenomena above referred to were too persistent to be called sporadic 
dumping. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 161 


which was so manifest in the pre-Revolutionary days. Such was 
the ardor that inspired the couplet: ! 
Of foreign gewgaws let’s be free, 
And wear the webs of Liberty. 

Such was the spirit that prompted the formation of numerous 
houses in the larger cities for the distribution of domestic manu- 
factures.” It communicated itself to Congress, too, where a re- 
print of Hamilton’s famous “Report on Manufactures” was 
ordered, and the Secretary of the Treasury was directed to collect 
information in regard to the various industries of the country, — 
and, as Mr. Stanwood has noted, these from a Republican 
Congress! ® 

In the several states, the popular enthusiasm found even more 
complete expression. The New York legislature of 1811 recom- 
mended that all its members present themselves at the next 
session clad in fabrics of American manufacture.* The legislature 
of Massachusetts offered to contract with the general govern- 
ment for the supply of blankets and clothing to fill the need in 
any contingency, which goods were to come principally from the 
manufactures of that commonwealth.’ In addition, there were 
state premiums, as well as those offered by private societies, for 
the encouragement of household production.® 

A somewhat similar wave of popular commendation for do- 
mestic manufactures arose in the years after the war, when it was 
supposed to be the British hope to “‘stifle in the cradle” the in- 
fant American industries. In New York, Governor Tompkins 
recommended the extension of ‘‘patronage and protection” to 
the clothing industry; and the legislature passed an act exempting 
wool and other textile factories from taxation and excusing all 
persons engaged in such business from militia duty, except in ex- 
treme necessities, and from jury duty in minor cases.’ In New 

1 Philadelphia General Advertiser, January 2, 1809. 

2 See below, p. 209. 3 Stanwood, American Tariff Controversies, i, 135. 

4 Niles, i, 312. S  Ibid., ii, 17. 6 See below, p. 178. 

7 New York Messages of the Governors, ii, 855; Laws, 1817, Chapter 64, passed 
February 28, 1817. In addition the earlier law giving premiums for household 


manufactures of woolens was revived: Laws, 1817, Chapter 240, passed April 15, 
1817. 


162 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Jersey, a tax heretofore laid upon cotton and wool manufactories 
was discontinued, and these objects specifically exempted from 
other taxation.! Patriotic societies raised their heads again, or 
now for the first time saw the light, — some state and some city 
organizations. The city societies owed their origin frequently 
to the efforts of a national institution, the American Society for 
the Encouragement of American Manufactures.? Moreover, the 
spirit spread westward, associations being formed in Kentucky 
in 1817, and in Cincinnati in 1819.* With the patriotic enthu- 
siasm, expressed in resolutions to abstain from the use of im- 
ported goods and to give preference to domestic manufactures, 
the latter society, curiously enough, mixed the spirit of economy: 
members should not purchase liquors, fruits, nuts, or preserves 
except in case of sickness; they should go without black clothes 
for mourning, and the like. 

This ebullition of patriotic sentiment for domestic manufac- 
tures, it may be noted, is the last one in which there appears to 
have been any substantial amount of popular feeling. From the 
associations above mentioned, it was but a step to a primarily 
propagandist organization, such as the Philadelphia Society for 
the Promotion of National Industry, which was then under the 
influence of Matthew Carey, one of our earliest protectionists.* 
Other societies of somewhat similar character followed,—and 
since that time the country has not lacked organizations of this 
type. Thus the phenomenon which is commonly spoken of 


1 Niles, ix, 194. Also, the governor of New Hampshire recommended the ex- 
emption of such establishments from taxation (ibid., x, 280). 

2 Bishop, ii, 238. Societies in Delaware and Pennsylvania are mentioned. John 
Adams, Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe were elected to membership in the New 
York Society for the Promotion of Useful Arts; and they accepted, Monroe in per- 
son (Niles, xii, 311, 412). 

3 Lippincott, History of Manufactures in the Ohio Valley, p. 94; Flint, “‘ Letters 
from America,” in Thwaites, American Travels, ix, 270. 

4 Of this Society, a representative from Massachusetts complained in Congress 
that it “has its branches in every part of the Union, with which it corresponds, and 
which it directs and instigates and sets in motion by the means of pamphlets and 
newspaper essays. Its inflammatory and unfounded statements have pervaded 
every part of the Union. Each member of the present Congress has been 
favored with enough to make two large volumes” (quoted in Stanwood, op. cit., 
i, 189). 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 163 


vaguely as “‘protection’’ may be considered to have roots in other 
soils than merely the self-interest of the “‘protected”’ industries. 
Both in form and spirit, the beginnings of the modern propagan- 
dist organizations may be traced back through this group of so- 
cieties just mentioned to even the simpler, purer, and more fiery 
associations which arose in the heat of the Revolutionary War, — 
indeed, to those ephemeral but popular societies that refused 
to drink tea or use imported woolens in the years prior to the 
Revolution. 

In addition to this more demonstrative type of aid to the bud- 
ding industry, though probably not unaffected by it, was the 
increase in tariff rates upon wool fabrics. From the first duty of 
5 per cent ad valorem, imposed by the tariff of 1789, the rates 
had gradually risen until in 1804 they reached 15 per cent.! In 
1812 the rate was raised to the distinctly protectionist figure of 
25 per cent, though by reason of the unsettled conditions that 
obtained during the life of that act the existence of such a duty 
probably had little influence. But with the act of 1816 begins 
the modern period of protection, the commencement of that 
struggle and argument surrounding the import taxes upon wool 
and wool manufactures which was to continue to the present 
day. Without attempting to follow the early movement through 
all its convolutions, something must be said as to its general 
course in the period to 1830. 

Niles had written in 1813, ‘Let Congress keep ‘steady’ for five 
years, and we shall not want fine cloths from abroad;”’? and in 
fact Congress maintained relatively ‘‘steady”’ conditions for 
much more than five years. The tariff of 1816 contained the 
same rate upon the great majority of wool cloths, 25 per cent, 
that had been adopted in 1812. For the less important classifica- 
tions, blankets and worsteds, a duty of 15 per cent was imposed. 
To be sure, a charge amounting to 15 per cent was laid upon raw 
wool imported, but not until the closing years of this tariff period 
did the purchases of wool from abroad become of quantity sufh- 


1 The rates had been as follows: 1789, 5 per cent; 1792, 714 per cent; 1794, Io 
per cent; 1800, 1214 per cent; and 1804, 15 per cent. 
2 Niles, iv, 294. 


164 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


cient to affect the situation.' The rates upon wool manufactures 
carried in this tariff act had strong support among those inter- 
ested in domestic manufactures. They followed substantially the 
recommendations made by Dallas, then Secretary of the Treasury, 
in his well-known report on manufactures presented in 1816. He 
had suggested a duty on all woolens of 28 per cent, and, in his 
classification of industries, had separated blankets and worsted 
goods from most of the manufactures of wool as subject to other 
considerations than pure protection.? Again, one as fervent for 
national self-dependence as Niles expostulated with a critic, that 
“‘the present tariff, in our opinion, is sufficient to protect our do- 
mestic manufactures under the regular state of things, to which 
we shall arrive bye and bye.”’? And, on the whole, events tended 
to justify this statement. After the exigencies of 1819 had been 
met, the industry progressed tranquilly, not with a feverish pros- 
perity, but at least undepressed by inordinate importations from 
abroad. To this situation, the imposition of the 6d. duty on wool 
by the British Parliament and the other factors already discussed 
made important contributions. In the American industry itself, 
the technical advance and the increase in the number of factories 
are witnesses to the relative strength of the domestic position. 
In 1824, however, after a narrow escape four years earlier, the 
tariff underwent revision. Apparently considerations affecting 
the adolescent wool manufacture had little influence in deter- 
mining the course of the general tariff measure; at least they 
played a much less prominent part than in many later tariff re- 
visions. The western and middle states passed the bill, with the 
South opposed and the New England states divided. At the 
final vote Massachusetts and Vermont, a large wool-manufactur- 
ing and an important wool-growing state, respectively, were 
decidedly opposed, while Connecticut, which was considerably 
interested in both industries, voted in favor of the act. Nor is an 
examination of the Congressional debates upon the bill fruitful 


1 Wright, pp. 62-63. In the years prior to 1820, some small amounts of wool 
were even exported (ibid., p. 63). 

2 State Papers, Finance, iii, 89-90, 93. 

+ Niles, xi,.79- 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 165 


of much evidence concerning the forces which shaped the wool 
duties. Seemingly there was both lukewarmness on the part of 
Congress and divided counsel in the camp of the beneficiaries. 
The latter fact is indicated by the American Annual Register in 
its subsequent account of the 1824 rates on wool cloths: ‘‘It is 
true, however, that opinions on these points (rates, etc.) were not 
unanimous, even among the parties interested. The manufac- 
turers feared that an increased duty on foreign cloths would be 
accompanied (and its beneficial effects to them counterbalanced) 
by an increased duty on wool. The capitalists who had (re- 
cently?) embarked in the industry, with extensive resources and 
improved machinery, were inclined to ascribe the (hitherto?) 
languishing condition of the manufacture to the imperfect man- 
ner in which it had been hitherto attempted; and feared that the 
effect of an increased protection would be destructive to domes- 
tic competition. From this and other causes the efforts of those 
engaged in this manufacture to obtain a substantial increase of 
protecting duties were less united and earnest than might other- 
wise have been expected.’”’! This situation, it may be remarked, 
was adequately remedied prior to the succeeding tariff campaign. 
At all events, the schedule of rates on wool manufactures carried 
in the act of 1824 was perhaps bound to be unsatisfactory to a 
large section of the manufacturing industry because of the manner 
of its enactment. In the eyes of this section it undoubtedly de- 
served the epithet afterwards applied to it: “‘a meager and reluc- 
tant tariff.” ? 

Upon manufactures of wool in general, the rate of duty, to be 
sure, was at once raised to 30 per cent ad valorem, and after June 
30, 1825 to 3314 per cent. Likewise, the rate on blankets and 
worsted stuff-goods, still considered separately, was increased to 
25 per cent. But there were corresponding drawbacks. A pro- 
viso — that legislative device which later was to make tariff 
schedules so complicated — was inserted to the effect that goods, 
except flannels and baizes, valued at less than 3314 cents per 


1 American Annual Register, 1826-1827, i, 103; quoted in Stanwood, op. cit., 
i, 229-230. 
2 Niles, xxxiii, 105, ““ Address of the Harrisburg Convention of 1827.” 


166 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


square yard should bear the special rate of 25 per cent, like the 
blankets and stuffs. This would let in some cheap fabrics of 
special interest to the South. Of more importance: Congress, 
as yet in happy ignorance of the “proper” relation between 
duties on the raw material and on the finished product, of com- 
pensatory duties, and the like, imposed duties on the unmanu- 
factured wool nearly as great as those on the manufactures 
themselves: 20 per cent at once, and after June 1, 1826, 30 
per cent. Of small comfort was the proviso here attached, that 
wool valued at less than 10 cents per pound should pay only 15 
per cent duty, since such cheap (and coarse) wool would go 
chiefly into the carpet industry. 

When the rates on wool and its manufactures reached their 
final positions, the wool-manufacturing industry had theoreti- 
cally a poorer defense against the foreign producer than under 
the preceding tariff. A domestic manufacturer employing the 
more expensive foreign wools would, upon the assumption that 
the raw material amounted to one-half the total cost of produc- 
tion, have a protection of only 18% per cent against the European 
manufacturer using similar wool. An American producer of 
cheap fabrics, such as abroad were valued at less than 33 % cents 
per square yard, who utilized the cheap foreign wools valued 
at less than ten cents a pound, would with the same assump- 
tion have a net protection of but 17% per cent. If the prices of 
domestic wools were raised by the full amount of the duties, the 
American manufacturer would, whatever type of raw material 
he bought, have the benefit of only these net rates. At the same 
time, the 6d. duty imposed in 1819 upon wool imported into 
England was repealed, — a feature of the so-called Huskisson 
reforms of the early twenties. 

Yet there is room for doubt whether the domestic industry, 
even with both these factors changed to its disadvantage, suf- 
fered peculiarly during the continuance of this tariff law. The 
brevity of the tarifi’s duration, particularly after the various 
wool duties became finally adjusted, prevents an accurate judg- 
ment; but, more than that, the commercial crisis in 1826 ob- 
scures the action of the tariff alone. Surely there is nothing in 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 167 


the statistics of importations to indicate that the domestic manu- 
_ facture was especially hard pressed from the foreign source. The 
complaints which led to the assembly of the Harrisburg Conven- 
tion in 1827 and in the succeeding year to an increase in the tariff 
on woolens were, it seems, primarily the result of general rather 
than particular business conditions. The circumstance is signifi- 
cant that the manufacturers who testified in the inquiry of the 
Committee on Manufactures in 1828 for the most part dated 
their hard times from 1826, not 1824.!_ Finally, the increase of 
the wool duty was probably a minor hardship. It is doubtful if 
the market for wool in this country was sufficiently well organized 
to take advantage of the variations in the import duties. With 
the modification in the character of domestic wool manufactures 
which was then gradually taking place, — the increasing pro- 
duction of medium-grade fabrics, in which wools of corresponding 
quality could be employed, — the effect of import duties on wool 
was further minimized. In the manufacture of such goods, the 
conditions after 1824 were by no means so bad as in the portions 
of the industry having to do with the finer grades of cloth.” 
However, the failure of Congress to deal fully and fairly with 
the tariff upon wool products in 1824, the special reaction upon 
the wool manufacture of the subsequent business depression, or 
perhaps other factors, caused special attention to be devoted to 
that industry in Washington during the succeeding years. In 
1827 a tariff bill dealing with wool and wool manufacture alone 
was introduced. The chief points of interest concerning this bill 
are the minima. Provision was made that the general rate of 
duty (it happened to be 33% per cent) upon wool cloths should 
be assessed upon all fabrics valued at or below 40 cents per square 
yard as if they were all worth the 40 cents; all between 40 cents 
and $2.50 per square yard as if they were valued at the latter 
figure; and similarly for those valued between $2.50 and $4.00. 
Obviously, the nominal rate would in practice be the actual one 
1 State Papers, Finance, v, 792-832. To be sure, some allowance must be made 
for the slower communication of those days, — a factor which would delay the 
effective operation of our tariff laws. But I doubt if this is sufficient explana- 


tion of the above-mentioned fact. 
2 Ibid., p. 820. 


168 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


only in the case of cloths valued at exactly the minima. As soon 
as the value of a cloth exceeded a given minimum point, the 
actual rate immediately became exceptionally heavy. This 
special bill, however, never became law, being defeated in the 
Senate by the deciding vote of Vice-President Calhoun.! 

The fate of this measure, however, instead of discouraging the 
protectionists, simply urged them on to greater efforts. Within 
three months after the defeat of the bill the call had gone out 
from the Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Manufac- 
tures, for a meeting at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, of representa- 
tives of those interested in wool and wool manufactures in each 
state: ‘‘to deliberate on what measures are proper to be taken, 
in the present posture of their affairs.” ? In response, informal 
conventions for the election of delegates were held all over the 
northern states, and at the Harrisburg meeting thirteen states, 
including even Virginia and Kentucky, were represented.* Before 
a half year had elapsed after Calhoun’s decisive vote, the general 
convention had been held, a proposed tariff bill drawn up, and 
an address to the country promulgated.* 

The proposals of the convention contained the following chief 
points. As regards raw wool, they urged freedom of ingress for 
the cheapest grades, those valued below eight cents per pound; 
and for the higher qualities, virtual prohibition.® With respect 
to wool cloths, the provisions were practically those contained 


1 In the light of future events, it is interesting to note that before the bill had 
passed the House, a minimum of $1.50 sponsored by Mr. Blaney of Maryland had 
been inserted. 

In the bill drawn up by the Committee on Manufactures in 1824, minima of 
40 and 80 cents were proposed; but these were removed on the floor of the House 
(Stanwood, op. cit., i, 227). 

2 Niles, xxxii, 237. The call sent to the counties of Pennsylvania was somewhat 
more general. The object was there stated to be: “to take into consideration the 
present state of the wool-growing and wool-manufacturing interests, and such other 
manufactures as may require encouragement”’ (ibid., p. 238). 

3 North, Bulletin, 1900, p. 236. 

4 The convention at Harrisburg met on July 30, and continued to August 3. 
See account of it in Niles, xxxii, 388-396. The address to the people was dated 
October 10, 1827; reprinted in Niles, xxxiii, too—108. 

5 For wool valued above 8 cents a pound, the duty was at once to be 20 cents, 
and to be increased steadily until it reached 50 cents. 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 169 


in the bill which had just missed passing a few months pre- 
viously. The system of minima was retained, with steps at 
50 cents, $2.50, $4.00 and $6.00. The ad valorem rates at these 
points, however, were increased to an ultimate 50 per cent.! The 
most important step in this ladder was that between 50 cents 
and $2.50. Within these two values would come the great 
majority of the cloths which would compete with American- 
made fabrics. What was essentially a specific duty of $1.25 was 
to be levied upon all cloths valued from 51 cents to $2.50. 
Upon the goods of which the value did not reach fairly close to 
$2.50, this tax would be prohibitive. Thus the Convention 
aimed at a virtual exclusion of both wool and manufactures 
of wool which would come into competition with American 
products.’ 

The passage through Congress of the tariff bill embodying 
these proposals is a matter which needs no special comment here.? 
The political jockeying, the significance of the investigation 
made by the Committee on Manufactures, and the attempted 
chicanery are not pertinent to a special study. It will suffice 
here to indicate the changes made in the bill before it became 
law. 

With regard to raw wool, the Harrisburg proposals were 
moderated in one respect and aggravated in another. A com- 
posite duty of four cents per pound plus 4o per cent, and later 
50 per cent ad valorem replaced the high specific duties con- 
templated by the convention. On the other hand, this duty was 
made applicable to all wools, even the low grades which the wool- 
growers had been willing to admit free.4 With respect to the 


1 The rate was at first to be 40 per cent, but was to increase until 50 per cent 
was reached. The customary exceptions among wool cloths, blankets and stuff- 
goods, were made; but it was petitioned that protection be given to blankets ade- 
quate “‘to secure their manufacture in the United States” (Niles, xxxii, 396). 

2 It should be added that recommendations were submitted with regard to other 
manufactures also, — iron, hemp, flax, spirits, and printed cotton goods, while 
(mirabile dictu!) the committee on glass reported that further protection was not 
needed by that industry. 

3 See Taussig, Tariff History, pp. 87-103. 

4 The Committee on Manufactures declared, in what we know now to have 
been false tones, that it ‘‘ will not disguise the fact, that it has been their intention 


170 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


manufactures of wool, the changes were apparently less extensive. 
The ad valorem rate was lowered to 45 per cent for most goods, 
though the rate of 50 per cent was retained for the highest grade. 
The system of minima was also retained. But one feature of that 
system was varied: a minimum was inserted at $1.00, breaking 
the long straddle between 50 cents and $2.50. Over this ap- 
parently minor change, feeling ran high. The ‘‘dollar minimum” 
was said to be “‘planted in the very midst of the woolen trade,” 
ruining the whole scheme of the bill. Largely on its account, 
Niles proposed that the title of the bill be changed to: ‘An act 
to prohibit the manufacture of certain woolen goods in the 
United States, and prevent the increase of sheep, and for other 
purposes.”’ 4 

Much could be written about the effects of this tariff: the net 
protection afforded by the duty on wool manufactures after 
allowance for the possible action of the wool duty; the variation 
in this theoretical net protection at the minima as compared with 
that at other points; the qualities of cloth most affected by the 
location of the dividing lines finally determined upon, and es- 
pecially by the insertion of the heartily condemned ‘dollar 
minimum;’’ and the extent of the “frauds upon the revenue”’ 
committed in the valuation of imported fabrics, frauds which 
were incited by this precious system of tariff duties. But ade- 
quate treatment of such themes would take us far afield. We 
can note only a few points. First, we should observe that the 
character of the tariff schedule made for wide differences of view 
concerning the real onerousness of the duties imposed. If one 


. .. to extend every protection which the nature of the case would admit to the 
grower of American wool” (State Papers, Finance, v, 780). For the true situation, 
see Taussig, op. cit. 

1 Niles, xxxiii, 385. 

Certain Treasury rulings coming at about this time made the situation more 
difficult from the point of view of the manufacturer. The lists and headings of 
cloth — portions of the fabric necessary to the weaving operation but discarded in 
the making of garments — were now excluded from the measurement made at 
the customs to determine the amount of dutiable cloth. Also, there was an aban- 
donment of the principle, hitherto observed, of adding 10 per cent to the invoice 
value, for charges incidental to exportation, and reckoning the duty thereon (Niles, 
XXXV, 211; Convention of the Friends of Domestic Industry, Report, p. 37. Cf. 
Taussig, Tariff History, p. 99, note). 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET I71 


looked at the tax placed upon goods valued at 50 cents, $1.00, 
$2.50, etc., — goods whose value agreed exactly with the minima, 
— the net protection was no greater, perhaps less, than that under 
the preceding tariff act.1. If one considered the goods whose 
value just exceeded the several dividing lines, — for example, a 
cloth worth $1.01 per yard, — the tax seemed inordinately high.? 
As a matter of practice, however, inordinate duties were for the 
most part avoided by importers through prudence or deceit. 
Those cloths which could not be brought in readily at or just 
below the minima, or which by hook or by crook could not be 
made so to do, were, it seems, not imported at all. Nor does 
there appear to be any question but that the cupidities of foreign 
exporters and domestic importers were stimulated to an extraor- 
dinary degree, and that such men frequently gave way to their 
evil promptings. Yet viewed after the lapse of a century, the 
whole affair can best be considered as no more than an episode, 
— interesting, to be sure, but of no appreciable consequence on 
the general course of the industry. 

Even in the years immediately following the law’s enactment, 


1 The net protection at the $1.00 minimum may be computed as follows: As- 
suming an average price of 30 cents a pound for the wool entering the cloth (Niles 
uses that figure in xxxiv, 109-110, and 37/4 cents in another place, xl, 404), the 
value of that wool abroad before the imposition of the duty would have been, 
roughly, 24 cents. Upon that the rates of the 1828 tariff would have amounted in 
ad valorem terms to 6624 per cent when the act was in full effect. Utilizing the 
assumption that the cost of the wool equals half the total cost of the cloth, the net 
protection on the latter would be: 


rere OL OMe Ele Gis oe, i) le a we nw we 50 per cent 
Deduct duty on the wool, 4% of 6624 percent ... 334 percent 
ier pidiecuiomon the fabiic ~ ss. 2 aps ss a ke 1624 per cent 


A manufacturer declared in the Free Trade Convention of 1831 that, when the duty 
on the raw material was taken into account, wool cloth received a protection of not 
more than 25 per cent, generally speaking (Lee, Exposition of the Evidence, No. IV, 
p. 8). 

2 This followed, of course, because a cloth like that mentioned above came under 
the next higher classification: the $1.01 fabric paid duty as if it were worth $2.50, 
and 45 per cent of $2.50 meant over 100 per cent of $1.01. 

3 As the protectionists said: the importer ‘‘ would descend in the rates below the 
respective minimums until the increased rate of duties should entirely absorb his 
profits. .. . The intervals would be supplied by the domestic manufacturer” (Niles, 
XXXli, 120); in other words, the importer would hug the minima. 


172 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


the influence of the act was almost negligible, or at least largely 
lost in the action of more powerful forces. In 1829, despite the 
fact that the duty on raw wool had been materially increased 
and that the importations of wool declined both in 1828 and 1829 
as compared with the preceding year, foreign wool was said to 
be 7 per cent and domestic wool 25 per cent lower than in 1827.1 
Nor was there a change for the better until the latter half of 
1830.2. This situation perhaps might be ascribed to the circum- 
stance that ‘‘the domestic growth of wool is amply protected, 
but the domestic consumption of it is not.”?? Such, however, 
does not seem to have been the fact. To be sure, Samuel Slater 
wrote in January, 1829, in a melancholy vein,* and a wool manu- 
facturer in the same year stated his belief that ‘‘there is scarcely 
a woolen manufacturer in New England making a cent at 
present.”’® But this situation was apparently quite independent 
of the tariff. The quantity of importations did not increase in 
1829 and 1830; they declined. And, when after 1830 the volume 
of imports mounted exceptionally, the domestic industry was 
said to be doing ‘‘an excellent business.” ® Before the tariff 
rates were modified, the manufacture had recovered from what 
was apparently a substantial business depression, — one which 
was due chiefly to the condition of general business, — and was 
on the road to prosperity. 

In sum, the period from 1760 to 1830 was one of transition in 


1 Niles, xxxvi, 82-84. 

2 See prices in Wright, p. 347. 

3 Niles, xxxiv, 266. 

4 Ammidown, Historical Collections, i, 473: ‘‘It is rather a pinching time here 
for money; though many borrowers of money say times are becoming more easy. 
Since the failure of Hurd (a wool manufacturer of Lowell), money-jobbers and anti- 
tariff folks have propounded almost every one who has seen or at least touched of 
late a cotton or woolen factory, that he must go down stream.” 

5 Niles, xxxvi, 298. He adds, however: ‘Indeed, the factory at which I am 
engaged has been continually losing since 1825; and, although in that year we paid 
60 cents for wool and 25 cents per yard for weaving, but now, at the low price of 
wool (he had quoted 33 cents for full-blooded Merino and Saxony) and paying 
only 6 cents per yard for weaving by power, we are losing.” 

6 Niles, xxxvili, 369. In 1830 the Middlesex Manufacturing Peas of Lowell, 
the largest establishment for the manufacture of wool that had yet been started in 
the country, was incorporated (North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 330). 


THE EXPANSION OF THE DOMESTIC MARKET 173 


the public attitude toward the industry. It began with popular 
incitement to manufacturing expansion flowing from the pa- 
triotic aspirations of the young country; and something of that 
same nationalistic spirit was preserved in the slogan of an 
‘““American system” which protectionists of the twenties and 
thirties extolled so warmly. However, in the interim, another 
bulwark to protection was being constructed, that of vested in- 
terest. Indeed, one of the extraordinary and most interesting 
features of the period as far as the tariff is concerned was the 
celerity with which the wool manufacture set about claiming for 
itself special protection against foreign importations, although 
of course this notoriety was shared with the wool-growing in- 
dustry. No other industries but these had the temerity to call 
a general conference of the parties interested, and to draw up a 
tarifi schedule for the adoption by Congress. This feature may 
or may not be considered a portent of the special position which 
Schedule K was to play in more recent tariff discussions. Inter- 
pretation would depend upon one’s bias. Surely, however, the 
assumption of this attitude by the wool manufacturers of the 
latter twenties is indicative of the new position and status of that 
industry. The manufacture had ceased to be a “‘precious em- 
bryo,”’ as Hamilton denominated the Hartford experiment, and 
had become a thing asserting rights and privileges. A new stage 
of development had been attained. 

But when one turns to a consideration of the net influence of 
the tariff in bringing about this new condition of affairs, he is 
not so sure that protection played as important a part as some 
of the manufacturers and writers of that period seemed to be- 
lieve. No doubt the duties aided in the maintenance of the manu- 
facture during the time of reorganization after the second war 
with England, supplying a screen behind which the forces of the 
domestic industry might be reformed; perhaps without this 
artificial assistance the more secure erection of an American 
wool-cloth production would have been somewhat longer delayed; 
but on the whole the tariff cannot, it seems to me, be considered 
of primary significance. Factors of more positive influence and of 
more permanent effect upon the industry are to be found in other 


174 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


lines, especially in the fields of technical development, changes 
in the form of industrial organization, and changes in the 
character of production. To the latter, accordingly, greater 
emphasis is given in this study of the wool-manufacturing 
industry. 


CHAPTER VIII 
DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 


THE history of the household manufacture of wool fabrics is for 
the period 1760 to 1830 quite a different story from that of the 
factory manufacture. At the first date the former system was the 
predominant form of production, occupying the whole field except 
for the minor handicraft production of worsted fabrics. By 1830 
the ultimate extinction of household manufacture was clearly 
forecast. The factory was then growing in competitive strength, 
and its influence was extending with the improvement in trans- 
portation and the better organization of the distributive agencies. 
The end might be considerably delayed, but the course was set. 

The United States, to be sure, was of too great a size and at the 
time too little settled to permit the break-up, at one time through- 
out its length and breadth, of a system of production so well 
suited to frontier or quasi-frontier conditions. One must, then, 
discriminate among the various sections of the country. For 
example, the volume of household manufacture was unquestion- 
ably at its height for the eastern states at the close of the Revolu- 
tionary War. Subsequently, while there evidently were intervals 
of increase, the tide was in the main flowing outward. But in the 
meanwhile other sections of the country were experiencing an 
enhancement in production under this system, which indeed had 
not begun to fail by the end of this period. 

Of the changing situation in the eastern part of the country 
information is most adequate. The interruptions in commercial 
transactions with England prior to the War of Independence and 
during that seven-year conflict apparently caused an increase in 
the area of household manufacture as the slack occasioned by 
decreased importations was taken up. Typical of this period was 
the case of Massachusetts: during the war, it was said, this state 
‘“‘sot into the manufacturing of almost all the clothing which each 
family had occasion for; . . . Scarce a:country man but had his 


175 


176 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


own clothing, which was the produce of his farm, and the industry 
of his family. . . . In these extensive manufactures of woolens, 
linen, cloths, and hosiery, the call for imported articles was every 
day decreasing, the demand lay principally among those whose 
pride would not permit them to wear the manufactures of their 
country, or the sudden demand for the army rendered it out of 
our power to furnish a full supply.” + But with the advent of 
peace, the household manufacture of wool fabrics returned to ap- 
proximately the same status as it had held before the war, re- 
treating before the extraordinary importation of English goods. 
The General Court of Massachusetts, for instance, declared in 
1785: ‘‘The quantity of woolens imported, their superior fabric, 
and the cheapness of them, have not only in a great measure put 
a stop to our looms, and to the several modes of manufacturing 
our wool, but have thereby been a principal cause of the decrease 
of sheep in the Commonwealth.” * Seemingly the situation in 
1790 and even after 1800 was not much different from that in 
1760, except that as time went on importations were penetrating 
somewhat farther into the country, and that here and there small 
factories were turning out a moderate quantity of machine-made 
or partially machine-made fabrics.® 

The most adequate and probably the most accurate description 
of the household industry with respect to various sorts of com- 
modities during the early nineties is that of Hamilton in his 
Report on Manufactures. Unfortunately, however, he usually 
does not discriminate between wool and other fabrics. At the 

1 Boston Independent Chronicle, August 12, 1784; quoted in Hill, First Stages of 
the Tariff Policy, p. 134. Note the emphasis even here upon the country districts, 
which, as already outlined, were particularly the field of household operations. 

2 Acts and Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1784-1785, p. 840; quoted 
in Tryon; p. 125. 

3 Quite unacceptable, as far as wool fabrics are concerned, are the statements 
derived ultimately from Tench Coxe, which appear in Bishop (i, 413-414) and are 
used by Wright (pp. 9-10): that ‘the importation of foreign manufactures was 
(about 1790) less by half than it was twenty years before;” and that throughout 
the state of Virginia, ‘‘ three-quarters of all the Clothing was manufactured by the 
people, who before the war, had imported seven-eighths of it.”” W.C. Ford, writing 
in 1791, also was exaggerating when he stated that “in that part of the United 


States situated to the south of Pennsylvania, there are no manufactures whatso- 
ever” (quoted in Beer, Commercial Policy, p. 72, note). 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION Le 


only point where he is dealing with wool goods alone, he says the 
household manufactures thereof “‘are carried on in different parts 
of the United States to a very interesting extent.’ ! Elsewhere he 
gives a fuller discussion of the home industries in general: ‘‘There 
is,” he says, ‘‘a vast scene of household manufacturing which con- 
tributes more largely to the supply of the community than could 
be imagined without having made it an object of particular in- 
quiry. This observation is the pleasing result of the investigation 
to which the subject of this report has led, and is applicable as 
well to the southern as to the middle and northern states. Great 
quantities of coarse cloths, coatings, serges and flannels, linsey- 
woolseys,” hosiery, and various cotton, tow, and linen fabrics, 
‘fare made in the household way. . . . It is computed in a num- 
ber of districts that two-thirds, three-fourths, and even four- 
fifths of all the clothing of the inhabitants are made by them- 
selves.” ? Contemporary testimony, however, emphasizes the 
point that these “‘districts’’ were chiefly rural.? 

Nothing occurred markedly to change the conditions under 
which the household industry existed until the introduction and 
dissemination of the carding machines and spinning jennies in the 


1 Taussig, State Papers on the Tariff, p. 98. The manufacture of wool hats is 
the only production using that fiber which had ‘‘acquired maturity,” i. e., control 
of the domestic market (zbid., p. 98). 

2 Taussig, State Papers on the Tariff, pp. 49-50. Hamilton states in passing that 
the household textiles are produced “‘in many instances to an extent not only suffi- 
cient for the supply of the families in which they are made, but for sale, and even 
in some cases for exportation” (p. 50). He must here refer, however, to linen or 
cotton fabrics, perhaps hosiery, other knit-goods, or wool hats. As will appear 
shortly, there seems never to have been any considerable sale of home-made wool 
cloths, and the possibility of their exportation is even more remote. 

Another account, nearly contemporaneous with, but less optimistic than Ham- 
ilton’s, is to be found in a letter of Phineas Bond to the Duke of Leeds, written in 
1789: ‘‘Many useful domestic manufactures have been resumed in the Eastern 
and middle States — from motives of economy, formerly most families raised a 
certain portion of the articles of their own domestic consumption; but the same 
reasons which caused a decrease of tillage operated in some measure to lessen the 
quantity of home manufactures”? (American Historical Association, Reports, 
1896, i, 631. See also, pp. 651-652). 

8 Phineas Bond’s ‘“‘Letters,”’ in American Historical Association, Reports, 1896, 
i, 631-632, 651-652; Drayton, View of South Carolina, p. 150; Melish, Travels, i, 
99, 115; ‘‘Hamilton Papers,” quoted by Tryon, pp. 140-141; Martin, History of 
Louisiana, ii, 234. 


178 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


last years of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth 
century,—a development which was followed shortly by the ad- 
dition of napping, shearing, and pressing machines to the equip- 
ment of the “‘fulling”’ mills or clothiers’ works.1 Moreover, just 
as these new mechanisms were giving increased strength to the 
household system, another occasion arose for more widespread 
household production, in the disturbances which ushered in the 
War of 1812. While the output of the new-sprung factory, which 
had been stimulated by the same events, probably absorbed the 
greater part of the demand surrendered by the decreased impor- 
tations, a portion of the deficiency was supplied by an enlarged 
home manufacture. 

When the difficulties with foreign nations began to disorganize 
the preéxisting course of supply, popular attention at first turned 
to the possibility of increased household production rather more 
than to that of enhanced factory output. Voluntary societies in 
various communities offered premiums upon woolen cloth from 
household looms;? and the country fairs almost invariably 
awarded prizes and premiums for such products. The state legis- 
latures fell in with the same policy. In Ohio the general assembly 
voted that “‘each person who had a family should be allowed to 
hold twelve sheep, the wool thereof, and all yarn and cloth manu- 
factured by such family, exempt from all attachments, distres- 
ses,’ etc.? Again, in Delaware sheep were exempted from taxa- 
tion by a law of 1809, and ten or less could not be seized for debt.* 
Tennessee and New York went further, granting premiums upon 
the best cloths produced in the households of their respective 
states. The latter had the more elaborate law, distributing $2500 
to $3500 each year from 1809 through 1814.° 


1 See above, pp. 87 ff. 

2 E.g., pamphlet of the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Domestic 
Manufactures, dated July 25, 1808. 

3 Niles, i, 393; Warden, Account of the United States, ii, 275. 

4 Laws of Delaware, iv, 267; quoted by Tryon, p. 148, note. 

5 Melish, Travels, ii, 193; Transactions of the New York Society for the Promo- 
tion of Useful Arts and Manufactures, iii, 225-226, 237-250; iv, Appendix 6. Cf. 
Tryon, pp. 148-152. The New York Society above mentioned made the first 
recommendation to the legislature with regard to such a law, and itself distributed 
nearly $2000 in premiums upon household fabrics during the five years. Factory 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 179 


The first attempt at a statistical measurement of household 
textile production was in connection with the Census of 18ro. 
The actual figures are of little value. Asa test of normal output 
they would be unacceptable because at this period a peculiar 
strain was being put upon the family production. Moreover, a 
high degree of error unavoidably attached to the collection of such 
figures at so early a date.’ Yet certain general and approxi- 
mate deductions from them are possible. The total quantity 
of cloths listed as woolen was roughly 9% million yards, out 
of a total textile production of some 72 million yards. The 
output of cotton fabrics was half again as large as that of 
woolen, and the manufacture of linen cloths over twice as 
great.2, With respect to the woolen fabrics alone, however, such 
other data, statistical and otherwise, as are available suggest the 
paramount position of this household production in the total 
domestic consumption of wool cloths. In contrast with the 9% 
million yards of household output, the factory product in 1810 as 
estimated at the time by Tench Coxe was only 200,000 yards. 
Allowance in total consumption must of course be made for im- 
portations,—of which we have no satisfactory figure in terms of 
quantity.? But, seemingly, Gallatin was conservative when he 


products were excluded from competition. Specimens of cloths awarded prizes 
are preserved in the library of the Albany Institute. 

1 The difficulties in securing an enumeration of this sort would at any time be 
well-nigh insurmountable, and at this period the novelty of census undertakings 
and the obstacles to communication probably heightened the error. 

2 The quantity of woolen fabrics was not separated from the aggregates in the 
cases of Massachusetts, Maryland, North Carolina, Kentucky, and in two of the 
territories. Another heading, ‘‘mixed and unnamed” fabrics, may contain some 
cloths of which wool was a component part, linsey-woolseys, cotton-warp negro 
cloths, and the like; and the total quantity so entered is over a third of the grand 
total— 26.8 million yards as compared with 72.4 million yards. However, in three 
instances, — the entries for Vermont, New York, and Delaware, — this “catch- 
all”? category contains but a negligible yardage. Apparently in these cases, mixed 
goods were thrown into some other subdivision, probably placed under woolen 
goods, since such fabrics were commonly spoken of as wool cloths. Presumably, 
then, the 26.8 millions of yards comprise cloths of which the character was not 
ascertained. 

3 State Papers, Finance, ii, 691 (Report of Tench Coxe). On importations, 
Clark (p. 253), quoting Pitkin, gives the quantity at this period as 5 million 
yards; but Pitkin’s figures are all in terms of value, and Clark does not indicate the 


180 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


made the contemporary estimate: that “about two-thirds of the 
clothing . . . worn and used by the inhabitants of the United 
States . . . isthe product of family manufactures.” ! 

The statistics also present a picture of the proportionate im- 
portance of the household production in the various sections of 
the country. Over 92 per cent, it appears, came from the states 
north of the Mason and Dixon line; some 1% per cent is given 
as the quota of the northwestern states and territories; and only 
the remaining percentage, approximately 6 per cent, was pro- 
duced in the South. That these proportions are approximately 
correct is indicated from a similar analysis of the number of card- 
ing machines and of fulling mills. Enumeration of these adjuncts 
to household manufacture was also made in this census and 
presumably was made moreaccurately.? The geographical distri- 
bution of these facilities was as follows: carding machines, north- 
eastern states, 89.6 per cent; West, 2.2 per cent; South, 8.2 per 
cent; and fulling mills, northeastern states, 90.1 per cent; West, 
3.3 per cent; and South, 6.6 percent. Obviously, the states from 
Pennsylvania northward were still predominantly the home of the 
household industry; the West was just beginning to make a show- 
ing in this regard; and the South, with at best but a 10 per cent 
ratio, was in proportion to her size and population much less de- 
pendent upon the household system of wool-cloth manufacture.’ 

A third feature of the family production brought out in the 


way in which he made the translation. Nor have I found any means of doing so 
with even moderate accuracy. 

1 State Papers, Finance, ii, 427. Gallatin confines his estimate to the people 
who ‘‘do not reside in cities;’’? but, in view of the relatively scant city population 
at the time, his statement would not have been far different presumably if he had 
included the whole country. 

* It might be contended that inasmuch as the carding machine was first em- 
ployed in New England, and spread thence southward and westward, a deduction 
from the number of them erected in 1810 would tend to underweight the southern 
and western states. However, the proportions with respect to this apparatus 
agree so closely with those regarding fulling mills as to give them greater apparent 
validity. 

3 When the states for which woolen-fabric production was not reported have been 
excluded, the per capita production of such cloths was in 1810: for the northeastern 
states, 2.8 yards, and in the South, only .3 of a yard. Again the ratio of approxi- 
mately nine to one is evident. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 181 


Census of 1510 was the relatively small per capita output in re- 
gions which were easily reached by internal commerce, or which 
included the larger towns.!_ This situation is illustrated by the 
conditions in the state of New York, of which a map is presented 





Household Manufacture of Woolen Cloths 
in New York State, 1810. 





Note: The shaded area embraces that third of the 
counties in the state which showed the highest per capita ? 
household production of woolen fabrics, including those fabrics in which wool was mixed with 
cotton or linen. 


herewith (Figure 6). It will be observed that the production of 
wool fabrics per head of population was relatively small in the 
counties which embrace New York and Albany, and those border- 
ing upon the lower reaches of the Hudson River. Tosomeextent, 
too, there was a correlation between the wool-growing coun- 
ties and the counties producing a large per capita value of wool 
cloth. For example, Washington, Cayuga, and Onandaga would 
appear in both lists.?, Such a picture of the household production 
is in accord with the analyses already made, and gives consider- 
able confirmation to the interpretation of the colonial period 
earlier presented. 

1 Cf. Tryon, p. 184. 

2 Dutchess County, curiously enough, was not a county of large cloth produc- 


tion. Possibly this is indicative of a growing trade in the finer wool for which 
Dutchess County was beginning to be famed. 


182 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


With the further growth of factory production, the household 
manufacture entered upon still another phase, at least in certain 
sections of the country. As will appear later, the early “‘manu- 
factories’ not infrequently carried on commission work for people 
in the surrounding region even after they had acquired a full com- 
plement of machinery for cloth manufacture and were indeed 
producing for a more distant market. Such concerns often main- 
tained an additional carding machine for custom work; and 
sometimes they advertised to spin, weave, finish, or indeed to 
carry through the whole series of processes in cloth production for 
their patrons.! This, however, was probably the last stage in the 
household manufacture. The mills at the same time or shortly 
afterwards adopted a policy of exchanging cloth for wool, or of 
keeping a supply of cloths ready for local sales; and from that it 
was but a small step to a complete extinguishment of production 
in the household.? With the increase in the number of factories 
after 1807 this phase of joint household-mill production became 
a significant one in the central and New England states; and 
after the peace in 1815, it was temporarily of still greater impor- 
tance, when the factories, suddenly exposed to impetuous compe- 
tition, sought any means of keeping their machinery running. 

The household manufacture suffered a reaction after the con- 

1 See below, pp. 222-224. 

* The stages might be arranged somewhat as follows: 

1. The simple household production, with the operations carried on solely in 
the home — usually of a brief duration in any community. 

2. The household-fulling mill stage, in which the finishing was customarily 
given out. 

3. The household-carding machine-fulling mill stage, in which both the card- 
ing and finishing were done on commission by outside agencies, or per- 
haps, as often as not, both at a single combined shop. 

4. The household-mill stage, the final one, in which any, several, or all the 
operations were conducted in the small wool factory upon command of its 
patrons. If all the processes were carried through at the mill, the only re- 
maining tie connecting it with the home was the ownership of the raw 
material; and properly speaking, this is not a sufficient justification for in- 
cluding this type of production among the varieties of “household” or- 
ganization. It would rather be one form of factory production. 

3 State Papers, Finance, v, 808, 811, 814; Benedict and Tracy, History of Sutton, 


Massachusetts, p. 535; Lippincott, Manufactures in the Ohio Valley, p. 75; Niles, 
xx, 86. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 183 


clusion of peace as did the factories, only a part of which may be 
laid to the transfer of a portion or the whole of its operations to 
mill-commission work. The committee on domestic manufac- 
tures at the Pittsfield Fair in 1817 called attention to a decrease 
in domestic productions that year, ‘‘probably occasioned by the 
peculiar condition of the times.”’! In Middletown, Connecticut, 
an ‘‘alarming diminution of our household manufactures”’ was 
observed in 1819, laid more specifically to the influx of foreign 
cloths.? In one town in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, the 
home production of wool fabrics, according to one historian, 
ceased in many families before 1822, though it continued longer 
in some.’ 

Nor was there in the eastern states a subsequent return to 
household manufacture that had any vigor or persistency. 
Rather there was a steady diminution in output, assisted in part 
by the greater attention being paid by the factories to cloths of 
the medium and common grades, — cassimeres, satinets, flannels, 
and the like, —and also in part by the steady improvement in the 
means of transportation. To be sure, there are exceptions to this 
statement as to nearly every generalization respecting the house- 
hold manufacture in any section of the United States. For ex- 
ample, in the district of Maine, a sparsely settled area in 1810, 
only 75 carding machines and 509 fulling mills were reported in 
that year. By 1832, however, as many as 350 carding machines 
and 345 fulling mills were enumerated, distributed quite generally 
through the state.* In addition, there were increases subsequent 
to 1810 in portions of several states, such as Pennsylvania and 
New York, as noted below. Nevertheless, the trend was pre- 
dominantly in the opposite direction. Such, for instance, was the 
testimony of well-informed persons who in 1832 were interrogated 
by the Secretary of the Treasury, McLane, in his inquiry as to 
the status of manufactures in the country. Among the questions 
which he put them were the following: “To what extent and 

1 Niles, xii, 47. 2 State Papers, Finance, ili, 454. 

8 Judd, History of Hadley, Massachusetts, p. 380, note. 

4 McLane’s Report, i, 65. There is a disagreement within this Report; an 


addition of the individual entries gives a total of 345, though McLane’s summary 
has the figure of 299. 


184 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


upon what kinds of articles is household manufacture carried on 
in the county (where the addressee resided)? Has it increased 
or decreased, and to what extent, since 1824?” 1 Replies to these 
queries from New England were nearly unanimous in indicating 
a reduction in family productions, though estimates vary widely 
from place to place. New Hampshire reported a decline of 20 
or 25 per cent, although in certain towns a much higher per- 
centage is suggested by the individual statements. In Massa- 
chusetts, the coastal counties contained little or no household 
production of any sort, although considerable was still retained 
in the hinterland. With regard to the whole region it was said: 
‘‘A few coarse woollens, and probably a trifling quantity of cot- 
tons, are produced by household manufacture, but probably not 
one-tenth part so many of either as in 1824.” In wool-growing 
states such as Vermont, the higher price of wool (probably after 
1829) encouraged farmers to sell their wool clips and buy cloth in 
the open market. 

In the middle states somewhat the same change appeared to 
have occurred, although the data are not here so full. In New 
Jersey and seemingly in eastern Pennsylvania household produc- 
tion was declining, at least in the years shortly before 1830; but 
in western Pennsylvania, as yet difficult of access, such manufac- 
ture had even recently increased.? Of New York, no reports were 
received in the inquiry of McLane above mentioned, but the 
course of events is discernible in the state census figures. In 1810, 
New York had been credited with a production of approximately 
3% million yards of woolen cloth, with the heaviest output in 
those counties which either held considerable numbers of sheep 
or lay to the northern or western parts of the state (see Figure 6 
above). In 1820, the production of wool fabrics in the households 
of the state, including both fulled and unfulled cloth, is given as 
neatly 4% million yards; and five years later, as approximately 
63 million yards.* The enhanced production for the state during 


1 McLane’s Report, i, 82. * Tbid.,i,87. See also pp. 78 and 136 of the same. 

3 Ibid., ii, 404, 407. 

4 Statistics of the 1820 Census are contained in Journal of the New York As- 
sembly, 45th Sess., 1822, Appendix A, p. 60. Those of the 1825 census in Journal of 
the New York Senate, 49th Sess., 1826, Appendix. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 185 


this period, as in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, was due pri- 
marily to the large increases in the northern and western coun- 
ties. But in 1825 the production had reached its zenith. With 
the completion of the Erie Canal, feeder canals in the central part 
of the state, and the Champlain Canal, came an added facility of 
commerce, an easier marketing of the products from these com- 
munities, and consequently a higher purchasing power and 
greater desire for cloths either from domestic factories or from 
foreign workshops.’ This altered situation is reflected in the 
yardage of household wool-cloth production ascertained by the 
next state census, that of 1835. At that time, the output in both 
fulled and unfulled woolens amounted to less than 5 million 
yards.” A similar story is told by the number of carding machines 
and fulling mills enumerated in the several censuses.? 

Such figures illustrate the fact already noted, that it is difficult 
to speak in generalizations of any section of the country, even 
of a single state. However, despite exceptions, it may, I believe, 
be truly said that after 1815 the tendency was definitely toward 
a lessening household production of wool fabrics in the old East, 
that which one visualizes as the settled portion of the middle 
and New England states at the close of the Revolution; and like- 
wise that after 1825 no state as a whole nor any considerable 
part of a state experienced an increase of such production. By 
the close of the period under discussion, 1830, the decline was 
well under way.* 


1 See below, pp. 279-282. 

2 Statistics contained in the New York Census for 1835, a separate volume. 

3 The full figures for cloths, carding machines, and fulling mills are given below. 
The statistics for cotton, linen, and other fabrics are also presented. They 
suggest that the condition spoken of in the text was not peculiar to the wool 
manufacture. 


Fulled cloth Flannel and woolen Cotton, linen,and Carding Fulling 
cloth not fulled other cloths Machines Mills 
1810 eae wees sees 431 427 
1820 1,958,712 2,451,107 5,635,085 1,233 9g 
1825 2,018,233 3,468,001 8,079,000 1,584 1,222 
1835 2,183,051 2,790,069 3,799;053 1,061 965 


4 The weakening economic pressure behind the household manufacture begins 
in the twenties to be evident in the pleas for its maintenance or increase which the 
“reformers” of the period were putting forward. In place of the call of patriotism 
or the needs of national aggrandizement was now placed such twaddle as the fol- 


186 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Of the southern states, where the household production of 
wool cloths was never important, with perhaps the exception of 
the Revolutionary War period, little need be said. Apparently 
the manufacture was maintained in some parts of the region, 
such as North Carolina and the upper sections of South Carolina 
and Georgia. Of the first named, it was asserted as late as 1828 
that there were “thousands of families in the state hardly con- 
suming one yard of imported cloths annually, being supplied 
from their own looms.”’! But with the rise of cotton to kingship 
in the South and Southwest, the growth in rice and the spread 
in tobacco culture, these areas became more and more com- 
pletely agricultural, and, with the exception of the “‘back coun- 
try,’ were supplied with “‘money crops”’ readily exchangeable 
for their requirements in manufactures. 

In the West, however, including Kentucky. and Tennessee, 
there was an increase in the household manufacture of wool 
fabrics during these years, a reproduction of the conditions which 
had existed in the more easterly regions ten or twenty years 
earlier. In the frontier days, as about 1785 in the Ohio settle- 
ments, the women had to spin and generally to weave all the 
cloth for their families.? Similarly, Michaux in his travels wrote 
of Kentucky and Tennessee at the beginning of the new cen- 
tury, that in both states ‘“‘the wealthiest people, as much from 
patriotism as economy, wear garments of the stuffs manufac- 
tured in the country.”’ The invocation of patriotic endeavor is 
common in the period; but what was probably the real cause is 
suggested in the succeeding sentence: ‘‘They also find this the 
only method of keeping the little money which they have in cir- 


lowing: “‘To encourage family industry is to destroy idleness, and to substitute in 
its place an honest rivalry for excellence, tending to make the fireside happy and 
independent” (New York Assembly Journal, 1825, p. 799). Similarly Niles, noting 
that ‘“‘tens of thousands of amiable, respectable and lovely young women”? are en- 
gaged in household manufactures, sees as the primary gain thereby that it drives 
away ‘‘the diseases and distresses of inanity”’ (xxi, 35). 

1 Niles, xxxv, 260. Other references to southern wool manufacture: Documen- 
tary History of American Industrial Society, i, 191-192, 334; li, 329; Warden, Ac- 
count of the United States, 1819, ii, 161; Clark, ‘‘ Manufactures during the Ante- 
Bellum and War Periods,” in South in the Building of the Nation, v, 314-334. 

2 American Pioneer, ii, 160. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 187 


culation and preventing it from passing to England.”! By rea- 
son of poor transportation facilities, the crops of the area had 
little effective purchasing power over non-local goods. 

Soon after the wave of permanent settlers had reached the 
West, the fulling mill made its appearance, and by 1810 Ohio 
was credited with twenty-one, Kentucky with thirty-three, and 
Tennessee with two such establishments.2, Then in about 1805 
carding machines had reached the other side of the mountains. 
The Census of 1510 reported a total of thirty-nine such machines 
in Ohio and Kentucky, and at about the same time the manufac- 
ture of cards and of spinning machines for family use began in 
Kentucky and Tennessee.* Simultaneously small factories were 
rising, but apparently as yet neither they nor importations 
played for any considerable period a significant réle in the supply 
of wool fabrics to these interior regions. 

The period around 1815 has been called ‘‘the supreme age of 
the handicraft system and home manufacturing” in the inland 
areas of the country, principally Kentucky, Tennessee, and the 
Northwest Territory ;* and indeed, as in the eastern states around 
1800, the family production was as yet free from significant com- 
petition on the part of domestic factories or foreign imports. 
But in volume of output the household manufacture continued 
to increase for a decade or two, and in relation to total consump- 
tion it was apparently able to retain its place until possibly as 
late as 1825. The Census of 1820, defective as that was, showed 
a considerable multiplication of carding and fulling shops over 
the number in 1810.5 In the same year, Hall in his Letters wrote: 
‘“‘A very large portion of the western people manufacture their 


1 Michaux, Travels, 1805, p. 296. See also Autobiography of Rev. J. B. Finley, 
p. 154; Hildreth, History of a Voyage from Marietta to New Orleans in 1805, p. 31; 
Hildreth, Pzoneer History, p. 394. 

2 Probably these figures are defective, less accurate than those for the eastern 
states. 

3 Howells, Life in Ohio, p. 8; Clark, p. 518. 

4 Tryon, p. 269. 

5 State Papers, Finance, iv, 447-455. In some cases there were several card- 
ing machines in one establishment. For instance, some shops in Ohio were 
said to hold six carding machines, and one was reported as containing forty- 
nine cards, all ‘‘employed by customers” (p. 191). 


188 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


own clothing; among the farmers the practice is universal: and 
it extends so far to other classes that it is not at all unusual to 
see professional gentlemen in affluent circumstances and men of 
high official rank clad in plain domestic fabrics.” } | 

Another observer of about the same date, in what appears to 
have been a conservative estimate, said: ‘“‘It is supposed that 
nearly two-thirds of all the clothing, linen, blankets, &c., of those 
inhabitants who reside in the interior of the country, are of home 
or household manufacture.” 2 Of Kentucky the ratio was placed 
higher: ‘“‘Not only all the servants and poorer class, but nine- 
tenths of the most wealthy and respectable owners of the soil 
are clad in homespun.” * In spite of improved navigation upon 
the Mississippi and Ohio rivers and of the betterment of over- 
land transportation from the eastern ports, the western farmer 
who in 1820 brought his produce only as far as Pittsburgh had 
to give 121% barrels of flour for a single yard of superfine broad- 
cloth.’ Obviously under such conditions the economic necessity 
for household manufacture was strong upon large sections of the 
population. 

Yet in the western states the rate of industrial development 
was much more rapid than in the older communities. The in- 
troduction of fulling mills and carding machines always followed 
closely upon the heels of settlement, and likewise there was an 
early erection of ‘‘woolen manufactories.”’ The first ‘‘manufac- 
tory” of the western country, that at Steubenville, Ohio, had 
commenced operations already in 1814-1815; and three years 
later Flint enumerated two mills in Pittsburgh and one each in 
Steubenville, Chillicothe, and Cincinnati, Ohio.2 Something of 
the peculiarly complicated conditions which prevailed in the 
West may be secured from Flint’s comment about the town of 
Millersburg, Ohio: “Today I have seen a number of young 
women on horseback, with packages of wool, going to, or return- 

1 Hall, Letters, p. 68. See also Howells, Life in Ohio, pp. 123-124; and Melish, 
Travels, li, esp. 193, 215. 

* Holmes, Account of the United States, 1823, p. 208. 

3 Kayser, Commercial Directory, 1823, p. 55. 


4 Niles, xx, 180. 
5 Flint, Letters from America, 1822, pp. 85, 102, 118, 150. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 189 


ing from, the carding-machine. At some of the houses the loom 
stands under a small porch by the door;”’ and yet ‘“‘ Miss does 
not wear the produce of her own hands.’”’! Evidently, while 
economic pressure impelled an extensive family manufacture, 
commercial and industrial progress had placed factory-made 
goods, — perhaps from the Steubenville factory,— at the dis- 
posal of the fastidious element in the household. By 1825 the 
proportion of total consumption derived from sources other than 
the home activities had probably become a significant factor in 
such states as Ohio and Kentucky, but if one is to judge by the 
experience of western New York and Pennsylvania, the volume 
of household production continued to increase for many years 
longer. In the regions still farther west, such as Illinois and 
Michigan, the home manufacture was perhaps as yet hardly 
past the “‘supreme age;”’ there it was still to acquire the pre- 
eminence and the well-organized form which it possessed in the 
East about 1800 or in Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee around 
1815. 

Now what can be said for the country as a whole? How in 
1830 did the quantity of household products compare with that 
of the young factories? Was the proportion of household pro- 
duction in the total domestic output increasing or decreasing? 
To the last question a confident answer can be given. Undoubt- 
edly each year the mills were winning the industry away from 
the homes. Even with due allowance for the westward expan- 
sion of the household manufacture, the share of household pro- 
duction in the nation’s wool-cloth output must be put down as 
decreasing. The Census of 1810 had indicated that twenty-four 
yards out of every twenty-five in domestic output had come 
from the home. Never again, at least after 1815, was the pro- 
portion to be so great. 

As to just what was the share retained by the household in 
1830, it is difficult to say. Even contemporary estimates dif- 
fered widely. Mr. Mallary, chairman of the House Committee 
on Manufactures, stated in the debates of 1828-1829 that 
home-made woolens reached forty million dollars, but factory- 


1 Flint, Letters from America, 1822, p. 129. 


I90 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


made goods scarcely twenty-two millions in value.’ Randall, 
who was interested in and was writing about wool-growing 
and wool-manufacturing throughout this period, implied in 
after years that ‘‘the proportion of home-made to factory 
woolens was, no doubt, annually decreasing”’ during the thirties, 
but that as late as 1839 a fair estimate would set the two down 
as even; and one might infer from this analysis that a sub- 
stantial excess of household over factory production existed in 
1830.2, On the other hand, we have the straightforward asser- 
tion of the Friends of Domestic Industry in 1831 that the pro- 
portion between the amount of wool worked up in factories to 
that wrought in families was as three to two.? How shall one 
reconcile these divergent opinions? ‘Taking into account the 
biases or prepossessions of these gentlemen, and also the im- 
ponderables of less definitely expressed opinions, less frequent 
references to household production, and the like, I am inclined 
to steer a middle course, not wide of that set by Randall. The 
volume of household production for the whole country was prob- 
ably still in excess of that proceeding from domestic factories. 
Perhaps a ratio of four to three would not be far off. But this 
situation, it should be remarked, was chiefly due to the renewal 
of household production in the West and in the frontier areas of 
the eastern states, e. g., in Maine. For the older communities 
a ratio such as that offered by the Friends of Domestic Industry 
would apparently be more proper. Moreover, the household 
manufacture was already doomed. The factory had displayed 
its superior productive power. Families in the neighborhood of 

1 Congressional Debates, March 4, 1828, col. 1733. 

* Randall, Sheep Husbandry, 1848, p. 127. Randall confessed that he had no 
data upon the subject; but, then, neither had anyone else. He quoted Mallary’s 
estimate (see above) and that of the Friends of Domestic Industry (see below), and 
remarked: ‘“‘It strikes me, however, that Mr. Mallary’s estimate is too high, and 
that of the Report of the ‘Friends of Domestic Industry’ too low.” 

3 Report of the Convention held by the Friends of Domestic Industry, p. 79. 
The New York Census of 1835, from which alone one can secure data upon house- 
hold and factory woolen manufactures at a given time, sets down a household pro- 
duction of 4,974,000 yards and a factory output (including cotton-mixed goods) of 
7,312,000 yards. If such were the situation in New York as late as 1835, surely the 


estimate of the Friends of Domestic Industry must be erroneous for the country as 
a whole five years earlier. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION IQI 


mills, if not as yet depending entirely upon ‘‘boughten”’ cloth, 
were utilizing more extensively the facilities of the factory 
through such arrangements as the manufacture of their wool on 
shares, or the spinning of their wool, or the weaving of their yarns 
in the mills. Where the means of communication permitted an 
easy marketing of factory-made goods, the household produc- 
tion tended rapidly to disappear, — and the coming of railroads 
meant an ever-widening area which would be affected by this 
force. The period of predominantly household manufacture in 
the newly settled parts of the country would not be so prolonged 
as it had been in the East.. Even for the whole of the United 
States, the complete extinction of this primary form of manu- 
facture could be foreseen. 


Household Production for Sale. 


It is a characteristic feature of the household manufacture in 
all cases that its products do not enter into commerce; and the 
American wool manufacture supplies no significant exception to 
this general rule. As has been pointed out, in 1760 the produc- 
tion in the families was carried on almost wholly “‘without the 
least design of sending any of it to market.” Certain later 
periods of stress led to occasional modifications of this situation. 
The general position and character of household manufacture 
remained the same, but the exceptions are sufficiently numerous 
to warrant passing attention. 

In the period of agitation that preceded the Revolution, for 
example, homespun is said to have been sold in New York. In- 
deed, the artificial demand of the times sent the market price of 
homespun so high that, according to the report, the producers 
were able to purchase good English cloths for themselves with the 
proceeds of its sale! Again, there are instances of communities 
producing such large quantities that probably some part of the 
output must have been surplus. Thus a “small country town” 
in Massachusetts, it is recorded, manufactured thirty thousand 
yards of cloth in 1767.2. So, too, during the Revolutionary War 


1 Documentary History of New York, i, 734. 
2 Weeden, pp. 732-733. 


192 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


itself, occasional references are to be found to trade in household 
fabrics. The contemporary newspapers carry advertisements of 
domestic cloths for sale, and there are a few cases where the 
prices of such fabrics were fixed by public authorities! Indeed, 
one can find mention of what were apparently small ‘‘putting- 
out” operations.” But on the whole, even in this period specially 
favorable to the household manufacture, the appearance of 
household products in the local markets or in wider commercial 
activities was unquestionably the abnormal phenomenon, and 
could have cut no considerable figure in the industrial or com- 
mercial operations of the time.? 

In the period subsequent to the Revolution, evidence pointing 
toward a commercialization of the family production is no more 
abundant. Country storekeepers would sometimes accept wool 
cloth in exchange for other goods; but the amounts never were 
large. A typical case is that of Manna Wadsworth & Company, 
of Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Their ledgers covering the years 
1791 to 1796 show a total of forty-one entries of this sort, or 
only seven a year; and the average quantity per entry is only 
fifteen yards.* Advertisements of such storekeepers, however, 
rarely mention a willingness to barter goods specifically for wool 
fabrics, although not infrequently inserting so extensive a list of 


1 E. g., the town of Dudley, Massachusetts: see Ammidown’s Historical Collec- 
tions, i, 418. 

2 See Boston News Letter, December 31, 1825; Weeden, pp. 789-790. In the 
former case, it was stated that ‘‘one gentleman only, at Barnstable, about fifty 
miles from Boston, who has, not long since, set up the woolen manufacture, re- 
ceives from the Spinners 500 Skeins of Yarn one Day with another.” The data 
presented by Weeden refer to payment for spinning as well as for weaving in a 
single case at Andover, Massachusetts, and to the fixing of spinning rates for woolen 
and worsted yarns at East Greenwich, Connecticut. 

8 Obviously no account is here taken of local inter-family exchanges of 
cloth for other articles, of cloth for. services, and the like, which might well 
be quite numerous, as in the colonial period (see above, p. 33). 

4 Ledgers of Manna Wadsworth & Company, preserved in the Berkshire Athe- 
naeum, Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The entries covered mostly checked or plain 
flannel, some few yards of “‘fulled cloth” and rarely ‘‘Broad cloth.”’ Cf. Tryon, 
pp. 134,141. Phineas Bond (1789) implies that there was sale of home-made cloths 
in the stores (American Historical Association Reports, 1896,i, 632). He also gives 
a case of putting-out of wool-spinning (ibid., p. 651), but apparently the purpose 
was relief to the poor. 


DIMINUTION OF HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 193 


acceptable ‘country produce” as: ‘‘Flax, Flax-seed, Wheat, 
Rye, Indian Corn, Barley, Butter, Tallow, Beeswax, Old Pewter, 
Brass, Cotton and Linen Bags, and Ashes.” } 

In the period of 1807 to 1815, when household operations were 
again specially stimulated, references to trade in homespun be- 
come more numerous. Gallatin intimated in his Report that as 
early as 1810 some cloths of this manufacture were finding sale; ? 
and there are isolated glimpses of the trade, such as the shipment 
from Berkshire County, Massachusetts, to Albany, New York, 
of thirty bales of woolens, the most of which, it is said, were 
manufactured in private families.? The storekeepers and others 
perhaps spoke more frequently now of wool cloths wanted or ac- 
ceptable.* In addition the Federal government showed a desire 
for household manufactures. Thomas Melvill, Jr., with the title 
of United States Superintendent, came to Pittsfield, Massachu- 
setts, soon after the outbreak of the War of 1812 and purchased 
cloth, not only from the local “factories,” but from the house- 
holds, one purpose of his work being said to be ‘‘the encour- 
agement of manufactures in private families.” ® He offered to 
purchase chiefly kerseys, checked and striped flannel, blankets, 
and stockings. The persistence of his efforts speaks of success in 
the procurement of household cloths. Moreover, it was reported 
in 1815 that whereas “‘at the commencement of the war Berkshire 
could only furnish, beyond her own consumption, two thousand 


1 Pittsfield Sun, February 25, 1809. In addition, occasionally proprietors of 
wool-carding shops and fulling mills accepted cloth or yarn in payment for their 
services (see e. g., Documentary History of American Industrial Society, ii, 328).., 

2 State Papers, Finance, ii, 427. 

3 Bolles, Industrial History, p. 376. 

4 Positive mention of wool cloths was still far from numerous: in the Pittsfield 
Sun, three or four advertisements in the course of a half dozen years; in the Middle- 
sex Gazette (Middletown, Connecticut), perhaps half a dozen; and in other current 
newspapers, such as the Massachusetts Spy, the Philadelphia Democratic Press, the 
Vermont Republican, and the Baltimore Federal Gazette, only one or two in the 
country and none in the city papers. 

5 Pittsfield Sun, August 15, 1812. 

6 [bid., October 15, 1812, March 4, 1813, December 2, 1813, December 22, 1814, 
and July 20, 1815. In the last advertisement, he states that he has, as agent for 
Thomas Melvill, Sr., 500 pounds of wool on which he wished to receive proposals 
for manufacture into cloth, probably by the factories, — another unusual situation. 


194 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


yards of woolen cloth, last fall (1814) one gentleman (presumably 
Melvill) alone purchased thirty thousand yards of soldiers’ 
cloths, manufactured in the county,” besides the finer goods that 
came from her factories! The advent of peace closed this 
period.’ | 

After the flood of importations which greeted the peace and 
the consequent decline of household manufacture in the eastern 
states, one hears even less of purchase or sale of family produc- 
tions. Of Connecticut it was said in 1816 that a part of the 
home output “‘is regularly sold to the country stores;”’ but prob- 
ably this refers to the previous war conditions. The practice 
probably passed away in such areas; but, as one might expect, 
it was transplanted to the back country. A report from Spartan- 
burg, South Carolina, as late as 1826 stated that of the woolens 
and cottons of coarse quality produced in the households of the 
community, some were made for sale;+ and apparently the same 
usage prevailed in the West, though never in any greater measure 
than earlier in the eastern states. 

The failure of household productions to enter commerce further 
than, for the most part, in local barter is not hard to under- 
stand. The cloths were coarse in quality and the supply uncer- 
tain. They could not hope to compete either with the imported 
fabrics or with the goods flowing from the domestic ‘“‘manufac- 
tories.” Special exigency might for a time give them a little 
wider currency, but the return of normal conditions would pen 
them again in their narrow field. Always commercial transac- 
tions in such goods were the exception, and household production 
for household use was the rule. 

1 Niles, viii, 56; quoting from the Albany Argus. 

Arthur Scholfield and his nephew, Isaac, are said to have sold ‘considerable 
quantities of gray mixed broadcloth... to the officers stationed at Pittsfield” 
(Holland, History of Western Massachusetts, ii, 558). 

2 Apparently this episode at Pittsfield was the only one of its kind. Search of 
government documents and of newspapers in other wool-manufacturing centers 
fails to reveal any other such affair. However, perhaps they occurred without 
leaving the record that appears in the Pittsfield case. 


3 State Papers, Finance, iii, 104; and a somewhat similar account, Niles, x, 82. 
4 Mills, South Carolina Statistics, p. 730. 


CHAPTER Ix 
CHANGES IN QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 


In 1760 the available market for goods produced outside the 
households was narrowly restricted. It consisted almost wholly 
of the more fastidious town population, supplied at the time, 
in fact, chiefly by the superior English fabrics imported from the 
mother country. And such continued to be the general character 
of the market down to the War of 1812. Goods to be salable had 
to be pleasing to the “ city beaux”’ who, as it was said, could ‘“‘look 
beyond convenience to elegance.”’! Only gradually, with the ex- 
pansion of the market, which has been spoken of in connection 
with increased importations, came the possibility of manufactur- 
ing the inferior qualities of wool cloths for general sale. 

In accordance with the market situation during the early years, 
when domestic factory production of cloth was first beginning, the 
efforts of such production were directed to a peculiarly large ex- 
tent toward the fabrication of the finer goods, especially broad- 
cloths. The Hartford mill, it will be recalled, was particularly 
interested in broadcloth manufacture. The whole project for the 
acquisition and wider culture of merino sheep was inspired largely 
by this consideration. The broadcloths in which succeeding Pres- 
idents were inaugurated attracted wide comment; the premiums 
offered by the various societies for promoting domestic manu- 
factures were highest in the case of broadcloths; and, generally 
speaking, the discussions of wool-cloth production centered upon 
this fabric to the practical exclusion of all others.? Similarly, any 
list of the more prominent concerns that existed in the period 
prior to 1815 would include mainly broadcloth manufacturers: 
e.g., the Scholfields, Colonel Humphreys of Connecticut, the 

1 Livingston in Transactions of the New York Society for Promoting Arts and 
Manufactures, 1806, ii, 91. Similarly, i, p. 32, “our beaux.” 


2 Cf. pamphlet of Pennsylvania Society, dated July 25, 1808; and Transactions 
of the New York Society, iii, 226, for premiums offered. 


195 


196 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Northampton Woolen Manufacturing Company in which James 
Shepherd was the dominant factor, the Du Ponts of Dela- 
ware, the Middletown (Connecticut) mill, Derby of Salem who 
imported eleven hundred merino sheep, and the Steubenville 
(Ohio) factory. Of the fourteen mills spoken of by Gallatin in 
1810, the greater number were, it appears, chiefly interested in 
fine-cloth production.! Indeed, as one writer said at about this 
time: ‘‘the finer the goods or the material proposed, the more 
ready (was) the disposition (of manufacturers to make them), the 
more abundant the quantity in proportion to the demand, and the 
more moderate the price.” ? 

Only gradually did the production of coarser fabrics gain 
ground. The increased demand for such goods on the part of the 
army occasioned somewhat greater manufacture. In 1812 con- 
siderable quantities of domestic kerseys were reported to have 
been contracted for by the government, a single woolen manu- 
facturer in New Hampshire agreeing to supply five thousand 
yards per month;?® and in the succeeding year the government was 
able to secure practically all its coarser fabrics from within the 
country.* Again, the demand of the southern states, in some de- 
gree shut off from English supplies, encouraged the production of 
such inferior cloths. Gallatin spoke of a few mills in the vicinity 
of Philadelphia and Baltimore, more closely in touch with the 
southern market, as engaged upon “coarse cloth and cassinet,”’ 
and the like.’ In addition, some northern mills began to seek this 
trade. For example, the Hazard mill in South Kingston, Rhode - 
Island, took up the production of kersey, which soon met with 
great demand in the southern market.® 


1 State Papers, Finance, ii, 434, Table E. Other broadcloth mills of this period 
are spoken of in Census of 1860, ili, p. Xxx. 

2 Pittsfield Sun, October 5, 1811, quoting the Philadelphia Democratic Press with 
reference to “the late experiments to procure homemade articles of military cloth- 
ing for the United States.”’ Some years later (1819), the Commissary-General of 
Purchases, charged (probably with much exaggeration) that the manufacturers 
‘during the war, with two or three exceptions, when the finer cloths commanded 
very high prices, and great profits, would not make a yard of (coarse) cloth for our 
suffering troops” (Senate Documents, 16th Cong., 1st Sess., No. 21, p. 8). 

3 Niles, ili, 60. 4 State Papers, Finance, ii, 816-817. 

5 Thid., 11, 434. 6 Gammell, Life of Rowland G. Hazard, p. 7. 


QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 197 


Then, after the close of the war, came a still greater movement. 
This had its roots in the increased division of labor within the 
country. Cities were growing up in which industrial and commer- 
cial life played an ever larger part. The enhancement of this city 
population alone is significant. Communities of 8000 souls and 
more had contained only 131,000 people in 1790, whereas by 1830 
they held 864,000. In proportion to the country’s total popula- 
tion, too, they were advancing: from 3.35 per cent to 6.72 per 
cent.! Moreover, the outlying districts had been brought closer 
to the budding factories with the development of turnpikes, and 
later of canals. Exchange of rural with urban production was 
facilitated, and in this trade wool-cloth output from the expand- 
ing mills had its proper share. 

Equally important with the growth in total volume of such 
trade in wool fabrics was the broadening in type of goods that this 
extension of the market required. The restricted and specialized 
market of the earlier period was becoming that broad and diver- 
sified market which the country has afforded ever since. The 
chief varieties of fabrics inferior to broadcloth which came to be 
more widely manufactured in domestic mills were: cassimeres, 
satinets, kerseys, cassinets, flannels, and blankets. The deriva- 
tion of these manufactures and their increased production 
through the period to 1830 deserve brief consideration. 

The leading variety among these new goods, at least from 
the viewpoint of quality, was the cassimere, a cloth of English 
origin. Another cloth of somewhat similar character, frequently 
met with in this period, was the kerseymere. In these fabrics the 
fulling, napping, and shearing were not carried so far as in the case 
of broadcloths. The texture, accordingly, was not so firm as that 
of broadcloths, and the face did not have the smoothness and 
sheen which were characteristic of the latter. Since these fabrics 
were then made up in what today would be called heavy weights, 
— probably twenty ounces per yard or more, — they probably 
resembled more the kersey or heavy overcoating of the present 
time than the cassimere now turned out. In color or design there 
seemingly was no difference at first between broadcloths and these 

1 Weber, Growth of Cities, p. 22. 


198 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


cassimeres and kerseymeres. All were manufactured in solid 
colors, — plain black, blue, and the like, — although perhaps 
gray mixtures were also produced.! However, in the cassimere 
and similar cloths lay the possibility of far greater use of design 
than in the more highly finished broadcloth, for design and heavy 
fulling are not compatible. And ultimately, in the “fancy cassi- 
meres”’ of the forties and fifties, style was introduced into 
woolen-cloth production through the manufacture of these 
newer fabrics.” 

Cassimeres and kerseymeres, then, were goods inferior in qual- 
ity to the noble broadcloth. The chief market for them, conse- 
quently, was at first among the less prosperous classes of the 
population, as the wealthy insisted upon the finer and older fabric; 
but, with some improvement in methods of production and with 
change in fashion of dress, they came more and more into use with 
the well-to-do. Moreover, the manufacture of cassimere and 
kerseymere, — especially the former, — seemed to thrive in the 
United States. Reference to their production in American mills 
became more frequent as the years went by; and the shipment of 
such goods from England to this country declined materially in 
the decade of the twenties.* This branch of the woolen manu- 
facture had become acclimatized in the United States. 

Ranging in quality below broadcloth, cassimeres, or kersey- 


1 There are various ways in which color may be imparted to wool cloth. The two 
most important ways, and the two concerned here, are the dyeing of the woven 
fabric, and the dyeing of the loose wool. In the latter case, — that employed in 
the construction of mixtures, and sometimes for medium or light shades of colors, — 
only a portion of the unwrought wool is usually dyed; and that portion is mixed 
with the undyed fiber in the proportions necessary to secure the desired effect or 
shade. 

* By style is here meant style in the way of pattern. Already style in the way 
of cloth-finish had been used. 

3 The classification among British export statistics which presumably covered 
cassimeres was that of ‘‘coatings.”” Exportation of coatings to the United States, 
which had averaged nearly 17,000 pieces in the years 1815-1818, dwindled until, in 
the early thirties, e. g., 1830 and 1832, none at all were reported or, as in other 
years, only a negligible quantity. Similarly, the exportation of kerseymeres, for 
which there was a separate classification in the British figures, declined steadily 
from approximately 38,000 pieces in 1815-1818 to little over 2000 in 1830- 
1832. 


QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 199 


meres, were yet two other cloths, satinet and cassinet, — the 
latter being a coarse variety of the former, and indeed one of the 
coarsest types of cloth produced in this period. These cloths, 
however, have a particular significance. They were made with 
cotton warps, and this was a new departure, not only for the 
American industry, but really for the wool manufacture every- 
where. There is no reference to any considerable employment of 
cotton warps in the British or other foreign wool manufactures 
prior to its use in the English worsted trade about 1834;1 and, by 
reason of the differentiation in England of the old-established 
wool manufacture from the up-start production of cotton cloth, 
together with a marked geographical localization, it is not im- 
probable that such should have been the case. In the youthful 
American industry, where all textiles were new and where manu- 
facturers frequently shifted from one branch to another, the dis- 
covery of the value of cotton-warp woolen fabrics was not a 
strange or surprising phenomenon. In addition, there was the im- 
petus, especially great in this country, toward the production of 
cheap fabrics, if at the same time these were still serviceable 
goods. Satinets and the similar, though coarser cassinets fulfilled 
these conditions. Of these particular cloths, one may add, there 
surely was no mention in accounts of British manufacture during 
this period. 

The first mention of satinet in this country occurs as early as 
1788; ? but the really large production of these fabrics did not be- 
gin until about 1808. James Beaumont of Canton, Massachu- 
setts, and one John Hill of Philadelphia were early manufacturers 
in this line; and they were followed closely by others, of whom the 
best known men were Abraham Marland of Andover, Massa- 

1 Baines, Yorkshire Past and Present, p. 684; James, Continuations and Additions, 
p. 228; Butterfield, Notes on the Worsted Industry, p. 42. 

I may have been overconservative with respect to the use of cotton warps in 
mixed cotton and wool goods in the British industry. I have seen no direct state- 
ment concerning the woolen branch of the industry, and no clear indication that 
a cotton warp was ever employed in any type of woolen fabric prior to its use in 
the American manufacture. However, information is most meager respecting the 
exact types of cloth turned out in the British woolen industry. In so far as types 


are indeed mentioned, they seem all to have been all-wool fabrics. 
2 Scharf and Westcott, op. cit., ili, 2314. 


200 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


chusetts, and Delano Abbott of Vernon, Connecticut.1 The 
establishments engaged in this production were usually small 
affairs, mostly one-set mills, and neither so large nor so prominent 
as the broadcloth concerns.? The case of Mr. Abbott is typical. 
He started life as a farmer, and was attracted to the wool manu- 
facture through accidentally running upon a piece of this novel 
fabric called satinet — the story alleges that the cloth was an im- 
ported affair, but probably it was merely sold as “‘imported.”? A 
billy of thirty spindles and a jenny of sixty were built for him by a 
local machinist and set up in an outbuilding near Mr. Abbott’s 
house, while in another were placed two hand looms. Only the 
spinning and weaving were undertaken, the carding and finish- 
ing being entrusted to the custom shops of the neighborhood.* 
Such, with variations, was probably the history of many satinet 
establishments. 

However, the manufacture in general prospered. The fabric 
fitted into the growing need for a serviceable and moderately 
priced cloth, especially at this time when more and more of the 
town population were discarding the knee-breeches of colonial 
times for the full-length trousers, theretofore worn only by work- 
ingmen. Reliance upon the more efficient cotton-manufacturing 
industry for the warps not only reduced the expense of plant to 
the wool manufacturer but gave him some advantage over the 


1 Bagnall, pp. 275, 339, 603-604; Philadelphia General Advertiser, January 2, 
1809. Beaumont wrote in his autobiography: About 1808 ‘‘I then (leaving cotton) 
began to manufacture all wool cloth, carcys (kerseys?) and sattinets. For 
the last article I got great credit, making my own cotton warps of Sea Island 
cotton, and employed English workmen, who beat them up well in the hand loom, 
so that when afterwards finished you could scarcely tell the back side from the 
face. I sold the finest of them for $3.50 a yard, both before and during the war of 
1812” (Bagnall, p. 275). This was probably a case of relatively fine production in 
this grade of fabric. 

2 A “‘one-set mill” was one containing one set of woolen carding machines, with 
the complement of spinning machinery and looms that would be kept busy on the 
wool which such carding machines would normally turn out. A “set” of carding 
machines, in turn, meant the two or usually three individual carding machines — 
first breaker and finisher, or first breaker, intermediate, and finisher — that were 
combined for a proper treatment of the wool in the carding process. 

3 The practice of misrepresentation was early a feature of the wool-cloth sale, 
at least among tailors. 

4 Bagnall, pp. 603-604. 


QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 201 


producer of all-wool goods. Furthermore, since the fabric did not 
aim at fineness of texture, the producer did not have to pay a 
premium for the less abundant high-quality wool of the country. 
But perhaps chief among the favorable influences was the rela- 
tively smaller amount of skill required in this line of manufacture. 
The lower grade of wool made the wool filling yarns less tenuous, 
the strong cotton warp gave added facility in weaving, and the 
plainer finish eliminated many of the difficulties in the final manu- 
facturing operations. So great, indeed, was the success of this 
manufacture that by the third decade in the century probably 
not far from half the factory production in this country was of 
this character. And meanwhile there had been a distinct drop in 
price. As one manufacturer reported, goods which ten years 
earlier had sold for $1.40 a yard, changed hands in 1832 for only 
60 cents,—and this despite the fact that there had been no 
importation of satinets from England.! 

The experience of the cheaper grade of cotton-warp fabrics, the 
cassinets above mentioned, or, as more frequently called, the 
“negro cloths,” is not quite so happy. These fabrics, to which 
might be joined the older “‘linseys,” were the lowest qualities of 
wool or part-wool cloth produced in this country. While satinets 
employed domestic wools, these goods were manufactured mainly 
out of cheap foreign wools; and accordingly were subjected to 
certain vicissitudes which the former escaped. The earlier pro- 
tective tariffs imposed simple ad valorem duties upon incoming 
wool, but in the “Tariff of Abominations” a mixed duty, four 
cents a pound plus forty and later fifty per cent ad valorem, was 
enacted, a duty which fell with special weight on the cheaper 
foreign staples. In the period of the 1824 tariff, according to the 
address of the Harrisburg Convention, “‘the consumption of Brit- 
ish manufactured negro cloths ... had materially decreased 


1 Hazard’s Register of Pennsylvania, xiv, 389; McLane, ii, 221. 

Already in 1828 domestic manufacturers were complaining of internal competi- 
tion in this article. Mr. William W. Young of Brandywine, Delaware, stated before 
the Committee on Manufactures: ‘‘The low price of sattinets is wholly owing to 
domestic competition and I do not know any other branch of the woolen manufac- 
ture in which domestic competition is felt to any considerable extent except in rela- 
tion to foreign as well.’ State Papers, Finance, v, 821. See also pp. 813 and 825. 


202 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


and importers had not been able to sell any quantity of them at 
prices to cover cost.’’! But in the subsequent period the domestic 
production was sensibly checked, though apparently the Amer- 
ican mills were still able to keep some of their machinery going. 
Except for this short period, however, the production of these 
inferior cloths, which had increased materially in the earlier 
twenties, formed a significant element in the American wool- 
manufacturing industry. 

Two other fabrics demand attention, blankets and flannels. 
Although these two have in later times been frequently classed 
together, as in tariff legislation, and although by reason of the 
relative simplicity of manufacture in both cases they might well 
be grouped together, their respective histories in the period under 
consideration were quite different. The production of blankets, 
except occasionally in the household way, is rarely, if ever, men- 
tioned in the years before the embargo and war. Then some 
manufacture appears to have developed. A committee of the 
Massachusetts legislature in 1812 secured engagements from in- 
dividuals to supply at least fifty thousand blankets for war pur- 
poses; and two establishments, it is known, those of Abraham 
Marland in Andover, Massachusetts, and of Aaron Buckland in 
Manchester, Connecticut, furnished goods of this sort “for the 
government”’ during the war.? Yet the references to blanket pro- 
duction continue to be infrequent; and as late as the thirties 
blankets remained an important article of importation. Failure 
to develop this line of manufacture was at times laid to the char- 
acter of our wool supply. For example, Niles once stated that 
‘“our coarsest wool is too fine, soft, and short for blankets.” * His 
idea seems to have been that there was a definite technical diffi- 
culty. However, this explanation is inadequate. Practically any 
type of wool can with greater or less facility be made into blankets, 
and surely fineness or shortness of staple was no real obstacle. Be- 

1 Niles, xxxiii, 190. Niles stated elsewhere (p. 208) that “homemade negro 
cloths are cheaper and better than the British.” 

2 Ibid., ii, 17; Abbot, History of Andover, p. 196; Bagnall, p. 220. 

3 Niles, ii, 9. The English were said to have an additional advantage in that 


the by-product of their worsted manufacture, the noils from the combing process, 
was available for use in the production of blankets (cbid., p. 52). 


QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 203 


sides, there is testimony, such as that of Mr. Marland, that there 
was “no wool more suitable for the making of blankets than the 
native wool of this country.” 1 There is more validity to the 
latter’s explanation of this failure to develop an American blanket 
manufacture. He found the difficulty in the fact that this native 
wool “‘has always borne too high a price to warrant the manufac- 
ture from it.”’ In other words, domestic wools could be used in 
other ways more advantageously. Blankets at that time appar- 
ently were made of much coarser wool than is now customarily 
employed. Wool akin to carpet types was utilized, and such fiber 
never was grown in any considerable quantities in the United 
States. Supplies were in some degree available from abroad, and, 
except for the period of the ‘‘ Tariff of Abominations,” they might 
be brought in under simple, low ad valorem duties.” Some of this 
coarse, low-priced wool did in fact come into the country; but 
apparently there were inadequacies and uncertainties in such im- 
portations, arising presumably from the lack of organization in 
the world’s wool trade, which made reliance upon foreign staple a 
definite check to increased blanket manufacture. Surely there is 
a consensus of opinion, of contemporaries and subsequent writers, 
that difficulty in the raw material end was an important obstacle 
to expansion in this section of the industry. However, the more 
significant cause seems to lie in the condition of technological 
equipment. Some of the cheap wool, especially that from South 
America, contained burrs which it was then impossible to elimi- 
nate easily. Not until the invention, by Mr. M. H. Simpson in 
1833, of a burring mechanism to remove this vegetable substance 
was it advantageous to use this staple even in the manufacture of 
blankets.2 Again, on account of the unusual width in which 
blankets must be woven, the power loom was not readily adapt- 
able to this production; and accordingly the American industry 
possessed no marked advantage over its foreign competitors. 
Whatever the cause, suffice it to note that though, as Mr. Marland 


1 State Papers, Finance, v, 798. Mr. Marland adds: “I do not think the manu- 
facture of blankets is carried on to any extent in this country at present (1828).” 

2 A specific or compound duty would tend to increase the actual duty expressed 
in ad valorem terms upon the wools of lower unit value. 

3 Bulletin, 1879, p. 44. 


204. THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


said, ‘‘the process of making blankets is very simple, easy, and 
cheap,” no considerable production of them actually took place 
prior to 1830. 

On the other hand, the flannel manufacture was, it seems, more 
successful than any of the phases of manufacture already noted. 
At that time flannel had a wide use, especially for underclothing 
and shirts. As such there was less need of a fine finish than in the 
case of broadcloth, cassimere, or even satinet. Indeed, the finish- 
ing operations for flannels are peculiarly simple, — little more 
than washing and pressing. The fabric is practically complete as 
it comes from the loom. Moreover, the common wool of the 
country was said to be particularly adapted to employment in 
flannels, while the type of yarn employed in its fabrication and 
the simple character of the weave contributed to the ease with 
which this cloth could be produced. 

Prior to the disturbances which ushered in the War of 1812, 
flannel for the domestic market came almost wholly from abroad, 
except for that produced in the household manner. The factory 
production of flannel was, as Tench Coxe said, one of the “‘ exten- 
sions of the woolen manufacture, produced by interruptions of the 
importations from Europe.” Among the first domestic wool 
manufacturers to enter this new line, indeed, the man who has 
been called the pioneer in the flannel production in this country, 
was Nathaniel Stevens of Andover, Massachusetts, who in 1814 
turned his whole mill to that venture. Another early producer 
was Abraham Marland, already mentioned.” Subsequent to that 
time the flannel manufacture made steady progress. By 1824 it 
was reported that as much as 690,000 yards of this fabric had been 
produced the previous year within forty miles of Boston. Soon 
production went forward in an even quicker pace. In 1827 it was 
remarked that “‘ American flannels are rapidly driving the foreign 
article out of the market,” ¢ and then within a couple of years that 

1 Coxe, Arts and Manufactures, p. xxx. 

2 250th Anniversary Souvenir of Andover, Massachusetts, p. 10; Bailey, History of 
Andover, p. 590; Bagnall, p. 340. The Stevens mill continued to run wholly or 
chiefly on flannels until 1876. 


3 Niles, xxv, 338, quoting the Boston Daily Advertiser. 
4 Ibid., xxxii, 290. 


QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 205 


“flannels now used are almost wholly American.” ! A rapid 
change in the status of the American flannel manufacture, though 
perhaps not quite so marked as these contemporaneous opinions 
suggest, is also evident in the course of flannel importations. 
Whereas in the calendar years of 1820-1824 the importation of 
flannels from England had averaged 2,346,000 yards, thereafter 
our imports thence steadily declined, until in 1834 the amount 
reported was but 211,000 yards. Rarely in the study of our in- 
dustrial and commercial history would one find such a change in 
the brief space of a decade. The explanation of this change seems 
to lie especially in the technical development of the wholeindustry. 
Because of the fabric’s simple construction, the flannel produc- 
tion received benefit from all the improvements secured any- 
where in the wool manufacture, — Goulding card, spinning jack, 
or power loom. For example, we know that the power loom was 
early employed in the domestic flannel mills, at a time when other 
branches of the American cloth manufacture were still using the 
hand loom.? But another factor in determining the course of the 
flannel manufacture was the tariff. In common with duties on 
other sorts of woolens, the tariff rates on flannels had been rising, 
but a specially high imposition was placed upon flannel importa- 
tions by the act of 1828. The duty on cheap flannels was de- 
scribed by Nathan Appleton as ‘‘a higher protection than on any 
other species of woolen goods.” * Again, the whole group of rates 
covering flannels was declared “‘fully adequate,” as Clay put it; 
while Niles went so far in 1832 as to “‘admit the fact that flannels 
are as if prohibited by the act of 1828.’ * Protection of this sort 
unquestionably had a considerable influence. It gave valuable 
support to the young flannel manufacture. On the other hand, 
protection alone cannot be credited with the result attained. It 
was effective largely because of the ready adaptability of this 
production to existing American conditions. The fact that the 
volume of importations had been declining even within tariff 


1 Niles, xxxvi, 284. 

2 See above, p. 124. 

3 Congressional Debates, 22nd Cong., rst Sess., col. 3808 (June 27, 1832). 
4 Jbid., i, 280 (February 2, 1832); Niles, xlii, 75. 


206 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


periods, and that domestic production continued to hold the field 
even after the extent of protection had been subsequently modi- 
fied, indicates that the fundamental conditions were quite ready 
for the new development. 

This survey of the types and character of domestic manufacture 
shows, then, a decided change in the character of factory output: 
whereas the early emphasis had been upon the manufacture of the 
finer qualities, especially broadcloth, by 1830 the domestic market 
for wool goods had expanded, or perhaps we might say deepened, 
until the greater bulk of the output was of medium and lower- 
grade cloths. Typical of the movement is the case of Dickinson, 
the Steubenville (Ohio) manufacturer. In 1819 he had begun 
operations with the manufacture of broadcloths. In 1828, after a 
few years of unprofitable operation, he states: ‘‘Our late deter- 
mination has been to make mostly coarser cloths.’”?! The newer 
development, to be sure, had not been uniformly successful in all 
lines, — the production of blankets especially proving to be of pe- 
culiarly slow growth. But other cloths, particularly cassimeres, 
had begun to cut away the ground from under the broadcloth 
manufacture, Inasmuch as such goods offered a possible substitute; 
flannel production was in full swing until, as one observer stated, 
“the quantity manufactured is ample for the consumption of the 
whole country;”? and in the satinet manufacture, the industry 
had developed a new fabric specially adapted to American needs 
and specially suited to American manufacturing conditions. 

The situation in American manufacture resulting from these 
several changes is pictured in a census of the industry taken by 
Benton and Barry. This enumeration really pertains to 1836, but 
the conditions of that date probably did not differ markedly from 
those obtaining at the beginning of the decade.* The 1488 sets of 
woolen machinery reported were divided on lines of output into 
the following groups and proportions: 

1 State Papers, Finance, v, 822. 

2 Appleton, Speech on the Tariff, January 23, 1833, p. 31. 

3 Benton and Barry, A Statistical View of the Number of Sheep and an Account of 
the Principal Woolen Manufactories. 


The word ‘‘set” as used in this enumeration has the meaning presented in pre- 
vious discussion; see above, p. 112, note 2. 


QUALITY OF DOMESTIC MANUFACTURE 207 


Type of Fabric Sets of Machinery Per cent of Total 
LECTUS 2) 344 224 
COSTES 0 0 178 11.9 
SUES a 4s) are ia rr 574 38.5 
USNS a 0 8 2 a A rr 158 10.6 
OEE ge a a 210 14.1 
mignkets, hats,and yarns ......... 24 1.8 


Obviously, almost four-fifths of the output was on fabrics which 
were distinctly of medium and coarse character. Broadcloth, 
once the chief aim of the American manufacture, was now a poor 
second among the several groups; and all signs pointed toward a 
yet further decline in its importance within the succeeding dec- 
ades. Adjustment in manufacture to the production of fabrics 
better adapted to American conditions of production had begun, 
and many years were to pass before the American industry could 
again aspire to any large manufacture of fine cloths. 


CHAPTER X 
THE DEVELOPMENT OF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 


THE expansion of the market for domestic wool manufactures, 
with the decline of importations and of household production and 
with the change in factory production to the lower-quality fabrics; 
had its more tangible side in the rise of agencies for the distribu- 
tion of wool goods. While this development is to some degree 
confused by the intermingling of the cotton with the wool tex- 
tiles, sufficient evidence is available to trace the general course of 
evolution in the latter industry and to picture the situation as it 
obtained around 1830. 

The early mills apparently enjoyed but a rather narrowly re- 
stricted local market for their products. The Hartford factory 
sold largely through the store of the Hartford merchant, Elisha 
Colt; and, indeed, this continued for some time to be a common 
means of selling at least a portion of the factory production. 
Leonard & Geddes of Wilmington, Delaware, who styled their 
establishment a ‘‘commission store for domestic manufactures,” 
advertised in 1812 that they had, and would continue to have, a 
general assortment of Du Pont’s cloths and cassimeres.! So, too, 
Jeremiah Van Rensselaer of Utica, New York, kept broadcloths 
and satinets as agent for the Oriskany Manufacturing Company.? 
These operations, supplemented frequently by direct sales at 
the mills themselves,? sufficed for local distribution; but the 

1 American Watchman, January 6, 1813. 

2 Utica Patriot, March 21, 1815. Other cases, though seemingly of less regular 
correspondence with manufacturers: The Bee (Hudson, New York), December 20, 
1808; Niles, i, 390; Massachusetts Spy, several instances in 1814 and 1815. 

3 American Watchman, September 15, 1810; Philadelphia Democratic Press, 
December 2, 1813; Providence Gazette, December 3, 1814; Massachusetts Spy, 
August 3, 1814. 

Occasionally a well-known manufacturer might have even wider personal in- 
fluence. For example, a tailor in Utica, New York, advertised in 1812 the receipt 


of cloths from Arthur Scholfield, then located in Pittsfield, Massachusetts (Colwm- 
bian Gazette, November 3, 1812). 


208 


DEVELOPMENT OF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 209 


thriving concerns soon found it necessary to establish wider 
contacts. 

The initial step in this development, as already intimated, 
came through the patriotic spirit of the times. Personsinterested 
in aiding the new American industries established warehouses for 
the disposition of manufactures in several of the larger cities, — 
institutions which also made advances upon these products. The 
Philadelphia Society for the Encouragement of Domestic Manu- 
factures seems to have been the pioneer in this movement. It was 
incorporated in 1807 with a capital of $10,000 and empowered to 
make advances either in cash or raw materials upon American 
manufactures, especially textiles, to the amount of half their 
value. ‘The goods were to be deposited at the Society’s ware- 
house and, after their sale, the balance above the advances was 
to be paid over with deductions only of the legal interest on the 
loan and a 5 per cent commission.! Similar institutions were soon 
erected at Baltimore and Alexandria.2, That they proved to be 
among the most useful investments of patriotic zeal is indicated 
by their financial success or by the growth in their sales. The 
Philadelphia Society during its first six years of existence paid 
dividends of 6 and 8 per cent; and the volume of transactions at 
the warehouse of the Athenian Society at Baltimore rose from a 
value of $17,000 in 1809 to one of $80,000 in 1812.8 

But the success of these enterprises is perhaps still better illus- 
trated through the imitation of their efforts by purely business 
concerns. Commercial undertakings of this character were also 
stimulated by the dislocation of normal international commerce in 
the period after 1807. Such new concerns — organized to sell on 
commission any sort of manufactures, but especially cotton and 
wool fabrics, and, by reason of the example or competition of the 
earlier Societies, to make advances upon goods deposited with 
them — were quickly established in such centers as Philadelphia, 
New York, Baltimore, and Boston, and had become quite numer- 

1 Bishop, ii, 118. 

2 There seem to have been two such warehouses in Baltimore; see Massachu- 
setts Spy, July 18, 1810, and Niles, i, 461-463. As regards Alexandria, see National 
Intelligencer, July 4, 1810. 

3 Bishop, ii, 118; Niles, ili, 395. 


210 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


ous before the close of the war. Perhaps as ambitious an under- 
taking as any was the so-called Commission Company of New 
York, incorporated in 1812 with a capital of $600,000. According 
to its announcements, it dealt in all the textiles — wool, cotton, 
flax, and hemp — upon which it agreed to make “‘liberal”’ ad- 
vances. Agencies were erected in various cities ‘‘in such a manner 
as to form a Chain of Connexions, and open Channels for the 
Disposal of Goods to every Point of the Union;” goods received 
in New York were forwarded to the “appropriate and best mar- 
ket;” and traveling agents were employed “‘to exhibit Patterns 
and Samples of Goods in the Ware-Houses of the Company.” ! 
The increasing scope of business done by such companies is also 
suggested by the fact that the possession of a partner “generally 
well acquainted”’ with Ohio and the western country was con- 
sidered a point worth calling to the attention of possible clients.? 

After the close of the War of 1812, and more particularly after 
the period of distress which followed hard upon the peace, came a 
development of even greater significance, the transference of va- 
rious enterprises from the distribution of foreign cloths to that of 
domestic fabrics. A case in point is that of A. & A. Lawrence, 
for years thereafter a famous house in the cotton and wool-textile 
trade. Previously it had been engaged over a considerable period 
solely in the sale of foreign goods, but after 1816 it came gradually 
to deal in American fabrics, cotton and woolen, selling on com- 
mission.’ Merchants began to turn their faces away from the sea, 
and to find in the increasing industrial development of the country 
an ever-broadening field for their activities. Probably not un- 
connected with this change was the rise of the agent-auction 
system in the sale of imported fabrics.‘ 

Now the establishment of new commission houses proceeded 
rapidly. Typical of their experiences is that of Joshua Clapp, a 
graduate of the house of Lawrence, who in 1821 set up a store in 
Boston.° His opening stock ‘‘consisted of twelve pieces of red 


1 Providence Gazette, May 22, 1813 and November 20, 1813. 

* Ibid., February 5, 1814; this advertisement pertained largely to cotton goods, 
but the concern also dealt in wool fabrics. 

3 Appleton, Memoir of Abbott Lawrence, p. 7. 4 See above, pp. 156-160. 

5 Massachusetts Spy, January 17, 1821. 


DEVELOPMENT OF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 211 


flannel, manufactured by Abraham Marland, of Andover; about 
the same quantity from the mill of Nathaniel Stevens, also of 
Andover; a few pieces of heavy, unsaleable specimens of Amer- 
ican broadcloth, from the Crowinshield mill in Danvers, I think, 
and a bale of American cotton cloth (though it may have been of 
India manufacture) . . . to fill up the shelves. Once in ten 
days or two weeks, the stock was replenished or increased, by the 
receipt of goods manufactured in the meantime in the factories. 
These were brought from Andover to Boston in a one-horse 
wagon, each load consisting of from twelve to twenty pieces of 
flannel.’’ At the start the accounts were only three in number, 
but in a year or two they had expanded to twelve or more; and 
thereafter the concern enjoyed a considerable measure of pros- 
perity.1 Besides this establishment of Clapp’s, other leading 
companies organized in this period were Lewis Tappan & Com- 
pany; Tucker, Sayles & Hitchcock; and Joel Carter & Company, 
the last of whom advertised at one time that he had consignments 
from ninety to a hundred different factories.2, Most of these firms 
had their head office in Boston, near by the important wool-manu- 
facturing centers; but some commission merchants located in 
other cities. When Bela Tiffany, who had been connected with 
Samuel Slater in the cotton manufacture at Dudley, entered the 
commission business together with his brother, Lyman, and one 
Samuel Wyman, they established their central office in Baltimore, 
and had branch houses in New York and Boston.? Tucker, Sayles 
& Hitchcock also had a New York office. However, up through 
1830 Boston maintained a distinct leadership in the systematic 
distribution of domestic cloths; and not for some years thereafter 
did New York begin to draw ahead.* 

1 Emmons, ‘“‘ Early Commission Houses,” Bulletin, 1891, p. 314. 

2 Shaw, Wool Trade of the United States, p. 29; Massachusetts Spy, February 12, 


1823 (Carter’s advertisement). 

3 Massachusetis Spy, January 22, 1817; Ammidown’s Historical Collections, i, 
477- 

4 It may also be observed that in a commercial directory of the period, 
that edited by Kayser in 1823, the differentiation among various merchan- 
dising concerns is carried much farther in the case of Boston than in that of 
other cities. This seems to indicate a greater development of the trade in that 
region. 


212 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


The early mills seem at first to have sent their products to 
several commission houses, the number of such houses employed 
and the quantity of goods sent to each varying from year to year. 
But from this practice 1t was an easy and wholly reasonable step 
to the employment of a single merchant for the sale of a mill’s 
total output. Thus we find the concern of Lewis Tappan & Com- 
pany in the twenties acting as the selling agent for the Wolcott 
Manufacturing Company, which had mills at Southbridge and 
Woodstock, Massachusetts; ! and the mill records of the Stevens 
mill at Andover and of the Slater plant at Webster show that at 
least from time to time a single selling house took the whole pro- 
duction of these establishments.? In fact, I am inclined to think 
that by 1830 this practice was by no means uncommon in the 
American industry. 

Among the various points of contact between the factory and 
the commission merchant or selling agent, none Is of so great sig- 
nificance in the present connection as the credit relation. Appar- 
ently the earlier practice of making advances on goods consigned 
for sale continued without change throughout this period. Adver- 
tisements of commission houses frequently carried the formula: 
“Cash liberally advanced on consignments.” *? But this was only 
one of the great liaisons. A less satisfactory type is described by 
Mr. George W. Bond. When the demand for wool was particu- 
larly keen — as in the period 1824-1828, according to Mr. Bond 
— ‘manufacturers had to go into the country to secure their 
supply for the year. This could be bought only for cash. To en- 
able themselves to do this, many were obliged to mortgage their 
mills and machinery to their selling agents. . . . Sooner or 
later nearly all of these mills failed and their agents were obliged 
to take possession under their mortgages.”’* Illustrations of this 
result are not wanting, though probably causes other than that 

1 Shaw, Wool Trade, pp. 29, 33; Ammidown’s Historical Collections, ii, 371. 

* Records of M. T. Stevens & Sons Company, and of S. Slater & Sons Company. 

3 Forexamples, see Massachusetts Spy, February 18,1818; January 1oand 17,1821. 

4 Report on Wool and Manufactures of Wool, 1887, p. lviii. 

The conditions in the purchase of wool as suggested by this case are of in- 


terest in view of the trend toward improvement of methods in wool-dealing, 
which was evident at about this period (see above, pp. 82-84). 


DEVELOPMENT OF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 213 


given by Mr. Bond contributed to the same end. Joshua Clapp 
in time controlled and managed the Litchfield mill, for the prod- 
ucts of which he had acted as a distributor.’ Amos Lawrence was 
treasurer and general agent for the Amesbury Flannel Manufac- 
turing Company in 1823.2, The Wolcott Manufacturing Company 
in 1831 passed into the hands of Sayles & Hitchcock, who incor- 
porated as the Hamilton Woolen Company, with Hitchcock as 
president, Sayles as clerk, and these two and another as directors.’ 
Finally, in the floating of new companies, the commission mer- 
chants played an important part. According to Mr. Bond, the 
stock of such concerns was largely taken by these houses.* In at 
least one case, the formation of the Middlesex Woolen Company, 
the evidence is quite clear. Here the trading house of W. & S. 
Lawrence was the prime mover in the enterprise, and remained 
for years closely allied to that concern.°® 

But commission houses apparently did not confine themselves 
always to selling on commission alone. Merchants of somewhat 
similar position in the importing field had been accustomed to 
purchase goods outright, and presumably this example had in- 
fluence in the distribution of domestic fabrics. A case in point 
concerns one of the earliest commission houses, that of Mr. Joshua 
Clapp. ‘‘During the summer of 1821,’ Mr. Clapp said in later 
years, “commission No. 3, the proprietor’s own, furnished the 
largest part of our business. Having ascertained the probable 
amount of importations in plaid worsted goods for the coming 
autumn, and finding the quantity limited, the merchant (Mr. 
Clapp) exercised his full credit and bought up in advance the 
stock due in Boston and largely in New York. As the season ad- 
vanced, these goods were sold at a profit.”"*> Probably this was 

1 Emmons, Bulletin, 1891, p. 314. 

2 Kayser, Commercial Directory, 1823, p. 108. 

3 Ammidown’s Historical Collections, ii, 374. 

To those above instanced, there might be added the case of the Fitchburg 
Woolen Mill in which at one time Farnum & Kimball, commission merchants of 
Boston, became part owners (Vose, in History of Worcester County, i, 271). 

4 Report on Wool and Manufactures of Wool, 1887, p. vii. 

5 Hunt, American Merchants, ii, 372; Lothrop, Life of William Lawrence, 


p. 16. 
© Bulletin, 1891, p. 315. 


214 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


not a conspicuous feature in the business of commission houses, 
and indeed such a practice might easily lead to a situation of con- 
flicting interests. However, perhaps we have here an indication 
of the manner in which commission houses changed into more 
independent concerns. 

Meanwhile, agencies other than the commission houses and sell- 
ing agents were springing up. With the extension of the market 
for wool fabrics, it became necessary or advantageous for selling 
houses, located chiefly in the larger cities, to turn over a portion 
of their work to others, to concerns who would make it their 
business to be familiar with the varying conditions of the divers 
smaller communities, and who would act as relayers in the trans- 
mission of goods to the increasing number of retailers. This elab- 
oration of the distributive system apparently did not occur before 
the twenties; at least there is no trace of it prior to that time. In 
that decade, however, one finds such a merchant as Joshua Clapp 
dealing with regular customers, Isaac Osgood, Charles B. Shaw, 
and others, who are described as “prosperous and solid jobbers, in- 
fluencing and holding largely the country trade.” ? A Committee 
of the New York legislature likewise includes them in a brief de- 
scription of the dry-goods sales organization which it incorporates 
in one of its reports. The jobbers, it says, “are an intermediate 
grade of merchants, between the wholesale and importing mer- 
chants and the retail shopkeepers.’ But seemingly the distribut- 
ing system had not as yet settled into what was later to be its 
normal form; for, as the description continues, these jobbers’ pur- 
chase largely at auctions, at the package sales, from wholesale 
importers, and in such other ways as they can obtain merchandise 
on reasonable terms. Some of them are also importers to a limited 
extent, and others occasionally receive goods on consignment.”’ 3 
Still it is obvious that, generally speaking, a commercial organiza- 
tion of somewhat modern character had developed to take care of 
the growing internal trade in wool manufactures. 


1 These intermediate merchants were chiefly located in the larger cities, espe- 
cially Boston, New York, and Baltimore. 

2 Emmons, Bulletin, 1891, p. 316. 

3 New York House Journal, 1829, p. 393. 


DEVELOPMENT OF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 215 


That the degree of development in this system would differ 
between the several sections of the country need hardly be sug- 
gested. Just as the industrial organization in the West went 
through many of the stages which had earlier formed the course 
of evolution in the East, so in a measure did the western commer- 
cial organization tread in the footsteps of eastern experience. As 
late as 1832 many of the factories in the middle states were still 
selling largely to local consumers, —and sometimes not even for 
cash. For example, the Xenia Woolen Factory of Greene County, 
Ohio, reported that “‘one-third of the goods made are sold at the 
factory, principally in barter for wool, provisions, and in lieu of 
wages to the workmen.”’! And the story was the same for the 
Licking County and Springsborough mills.2, Indeed, considerable 
local distribution of their products was for many years thereafter 
a feature in the operation of many western mills. 

Before we leave this phase of our subject, however, something 
must be said of that type of distributive agency — “auctions”’ 
and ‘“‘package sales’”’ — mentioned just above, and discussed in 
connection with the import trade.? The auction system was, in 

fact, enfant terrible of the whole distributive organization. It 
was a serious disturbing factor, not only on account of the insta- 
bility which it gave to values, but because it broke in upon the 
arrangements made and being made by the other agencies. As 
one observer put it: “A greater evil to the regular resident mer- 
chants and manufacturers of New York (and indeed of other 
cities) than the auction system does not exist under the sun.” 4 
The import trade, as previous analysis has indicated, was most 
seriously affected, since there the auction method of sale played 
directly into the hands of the foreign merchant, relieving him from 
the necessity of maintaining any considerable organization within 
the country; but the commerce in domestic goods was also em- 
barrassed to a very considerable degree. Dealers in American 
fabrics found themselves faced with a severe competition, and a 


1 McLane’s Report, ii, 862. 

2 Ibid. The Old Town Factory, Old Town, Ohio, made the report that it 
“carded last year 6000 pounds of wool for household manufactures, and dressed, 
and dyed, and finished 1500 yards in addition.” 

3 See above, pp. 156-160. 4 Niles, xxxili, 388. 


216 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


competition which tended to make all their business extremely 
speculative. Moreover, they could not control the jobbers, who 
instead sought bargains in the auction sales. Unless these jobbers 
were purchasers, remarked the New York legislative committee 
above mentioned, these sales “‘ would be but small, compared to 
what they now are.” And, again, these jobbing houses com- 
plained because their business too was seriously disrupted: coun- 
try dealers and shopkeepers went over the jobbers’ heads and 
bought directly of the auctioneers.’ So prevalent did this be- 
come, that the retail trade was itself rendered subject to violent 
fluctuations. Speaking of a certain type of cotton fabric — but 
there is no reason to suspect different conditions in the woolen 
trade — a retailer wrote: ‘“‘I have known prints to sell at 28 cents 
and go down to 21 cents in less than five minutes. I have known 
an article that was not very plenty, to advance in a few days from 
35 to 65 cents, by the competition in the auction room. And that 
article in a few weeks after sold in large quantities at 22 to 25 
cents; and had it not been for the auctions, they would never 
have been higher than 35 cents, as they could be well afforded at 
that price.” These fluctuations, he said, kept the retailer always 
with one eye on the auction sales instead of both on his legitimate 
business, and always readjusting his prices lest his competitor 
across the street, who had just replenished his stock at the auc- 
tions, should undersell him.?, While these accounts are probably 
exaggerated, for suppression of these sales was a subject of much 
debate in this period, there can be little doubt that the system 


1 New York Assembly Journal, 1829, pp. 392-393. See also Emigrant’s Guide, 
by an Old Scene Painter, 1816, p. 48; and Flint’s Letters, in Thwaites’s Travels, 
ix, 59. However, there is some indication that regular merchants dealing in do- 
mestic textiles were not averse to using the auction system themselves if it served 
their purpose. For an example involving cotton goods, see Appleton, Introduction 
of the Power Loom, p. 12. 

2 Niles, xxxiv, 350. 

In a private letter, dated Sch tense 27, 1833, Mr. David Campbell, Jr., New 
York agent for the Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company of Pittsfield, expressed 
his concern over the effects of the auction system: ‘‘I am a good deal staggered 
at the vast quantity (of cloth) thrown into auction, but the holders must realize 
upon them to pay duty. That is the squeezer upon them and what is our safety in 
future?” (Letter reproduced in the Pittsfield Sun, December 26, 1895.) 


DEVELOPMENT OF DISTRIBUTIVE AGENCIES 217 


was a cause of substantial disturbance and unsettlement in 
American commercial transactions. 

Yet despite condemnation of the system by various advocates 
of American manufacturing development, it is interesting to note 
that domestic manufacturers and merchants of textiles came to 
utilize this method of distribution in increasing volume. Cer- 
tainly references to the sale of domestic wool fabrics at auction 
become more frequent as the years approach 1830. Typical 
perhaps of the manner in which American producers became in- 
terested in this form of sale is the case of Mr. Sykes, wool manu- 
facturer of Baltimore. In 1824, ‘‘his stock being heavy,’ he sold 
some portion of his goods at public auction. Apparently the re- 
sults were most satisfactory. ‘‘They so well sustained the com- 
petition with the British goods,” it is stated, that he proposed in 
the succeeding year to dispose of a greater quantity of cloth in 
that manner.” Others followed Mr. Sykes’s example. On Sep- 
tember 12, 1826, a single auction sale was held to dispose of one 
hundred and sixty packages and over fifteen hundred pieces of 
American wool fabrics.? Again, several of the manufacturers who 
testified before the Committee on Manufactures in 1828, stated 
that their sales were sometimes or always effected in this manner.* 
For American textiles as a whole, moreover, data relating to sales 
in New York City give confirmatory evidence. These indicate 
that whereas in the years 1818-1820 ‘“‘American Dry Goods”’ 
formed only an eighth of the total volume of “‘Dry Goods,” by 
the closing years of the decade they comprised nearly one-third.® 


1 A memorial from the Friends of Domestic Industry in 1819 attacked auction 
sales of domestic goods, not merely because of their disturbing effect on prices, but 
also of their reaction upon quality of production. Such sales, they said, “‘tend to 
encourage the manufacture of inferior fabrics, and thereby injure the reputation of 
American fabrics generally” (State Papers, Finance, ili, 442). 

The city of New York apparently was the chief center of these auction sales, 
although Philadelphia and Baltimore also participated in the trade. The impor- 
tance of the New York dealings of this type is suggested by the figures, to be pres- 
ently adduced, of ‘‘ Dry Goods” sold in this manner. 

2 Niles, xxix, 49. 

3 Tbid., xxxi, 116. See also zbid., xxxv, 103. 

4 State Papers, Finance, v, 808, 817, and 819. 

5 New York Documents, Report of the Comptroller, 1843, pp. 130-131: “‘State- 
ment showing the amount of the various kinds of goods sold at auction in the city 


218 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


It is, of course, impossible even to estimate the proportion of 
American wool fabrics which was marketed through the auction 
sales, but the evidence points to a substantial, and during this 
period an increasing, importance of this sales method in the 
American trade. 

Yet the alternate and better organized system of distribution 
was making headway even during these years, whatever the dis- 
turbing influences of the auction system. And the steady evolu- 
tion of a better articulated system is of special significance in the 
history of wool manufacturing. The auction method, unorgan- 
ized as it was in this period, was distinctly the sign of an immature 
market for wool fabrics. It suggested a lack of regularity in the 
demand for such goods and the failure of woolen factories to pro- 
vide an even and orderly flow of products to the consuming areas. 
The elaboration of the newer system was a natural result of the 
growing maturity of wool-cloth manufacturing and marketing, 
while the development of that “‘intermediate grade of merchants,” 
the jobbers, indicates the increasing geographical expansion of the 
trade. That the complete modern system of distribution had not 
been worked out before 1830 is not surprising. The manufactur- 
ing end had not as yet reached full maturity, nor had the com- 
mercial agencies had time to work out entirely their relationships 
with the mills and among themselves. The feature most note- 
worthy in the development before 1830 was: that the marketing 
organization manifested the effect of a widening trade in wool 
fabrics, the same widening trade which made possible the estab- 
lishment of manufacturing upon the factory basis. 


of New York, from 1818 to 1841.”’ Averages by three-year periods are as follows 
in thousands of dollars: 


Years American Foreign Total of all 
Dry Goods Dry Goods Goods 
1878—26 (2 eae een) rs ee $922 $6567 $11,707 
TOIT 23» \ csi appre tated ate oe neatoate 1564 8745 14,420 
1824226), 32 8a RO ee ere eae ees 3166 II,851 20,304 
TS29 306 Ge oe Se ee 4320 12,426 22,535 


T8ZO=S20 och eae eer eee 4647 9546 20,921 


CHAPTER XI 
THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 
1. The Development of the Factory. 


THE examination which has been made into the technical progress 
within the wool manufacture and especially into the changes that 
were taking place in the market for domestic cloths, has unavoid- 
ably given advance notice of the central feature in the industry’s 
development up to 1830: the rise of the factory. In 1760 no wool- 
working factory existed, merely a widespread household pro- 
duction of woolen fabrics, —to which the numerous fulling mills 
lent their aid, — and a minor manufacture of worsted cloths upon 
the handicraft system. By 1830, however, production of wool 
cloth in factories was undoubtedly the most significant, if not the 
predominant method of wool-working at that time. In volume of 
manufacture, factory output might not hold first place by reason 
of the continued large production of household goods in the less 
advanced sections of the country; but the market dominated by 
the factory was steadily expanding, and all signs pointed to the 
factory’s ultimate full ascendancy. The steps by which this 
transformation came about, the source of the capital and the 
character of labor attracted to the new enterprises, the magnitude 
of factory production at that period, and the characteristics of the 
typical factory of that era, — these are the matters which now 
invite consideration." 


1 The exact definition of a ‘‘factory” is not here a matter of prime importance; 
nor does it seem necessary to follow Clark in differentiating between a “ mill” and a 
“factory” (Clark, p. 447). However, Clark is right in that it is difficult to deter- 
mine just when a concern becomes a “factory.” “It is not a question,” he says, 
“‘of specialization, nor ownership, nor completeness of process, nor size, but rather 
depends upon a combination of equipment and organization” (ibid., p. 447). I 
am inclined to stress these latter features: a complete or nearly complete mechanical 
equipment for turning raw wool into finished cloth, and an organization in which 
the proprietor is occupied with management alone and the workers with supervision 
of actual manufacturing operations. The latter consideration, of course, is tied up 
intimately with the matter of size, but organization is the more significant factor. 


219 


220 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


In tracing the steps by which the manufacture of woolen fabrics 
passed from the household into the factory, it is easy to become 
too dogmatic, to give the appearance of a precise series of changes 
when, as a matter of fact, such regularity of development did not 
obtain. Neither here, nor, as I suspect, in most similar develop- 
ments, was there the same usual sequence of forms in all sections 
of the country and at all times. Exceptions to any generalization 
are frequent. Nevertheless, in the rise of the American wool- 
working factory before 1830, certain organizations are often met 
with at one stage and during a limited period, which with quite 
frequent occurrence give way somewhat later to a different form. 
One may therefore arrange a sequence of considerable validity, 
admittedly not a series through which each and every establish- 
ment was bound to go, yet one which represents the normal and 
typical history for the whole industry. 

After the introduction of the new technical equipment, the first 
manufacture of cloth for sale took place in establishments operat- 
ing on a very small scale. Indeed, the method of production was 
more nearly akin to the handicraft than to the factory system. A 
typical case is that of James Scholfield. In 1802 he came to North 
Andover, Massachusetts, and set up a manufacture of woolen 
cloth. His house, which in fact still stands, was scarcely larger 
than the ordinary country woodshed. He devoted a part of this 
house, or a part of the house and an out-building, to spinning- 
jacks and a loom, or perhaps two looms. With the aid of these 
mechanisms, and assisted by his family, he produced a little broad- 
cloth.2, Similarly, Samuel Mayall, who contests with the Schol- 
fields priority in the introduction of the carding machine into the 
United States, later conducted a shop for wool-carding and cloth- 
dressing in Gray, Maine, and manufactured cloth in a small way.® 
Even as late as 1812, or shortly after that, two Englishmen “ reg- 


1 Tryon (p. 272) gives a fairly workable series of stages: (1) Home absolutely 
independent of factory; (2) Factory supplementary to home; (3) Factory pre- 
paratory for home; and (4) Factory independent of home. Yet, as will appear, 
these stages are subject to some emendation and interpretation. 

* Bagnall, p. 308. The attempt does not appear to have been successful finan- 
cially, perhaps by reason of its location so near the port of Boston. 

3 North, Bulletin, 1899, pp. 215-216. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 221 


ularly brought up at the manufacturing of woolen cloth in all its 
branches” were setting up in Kennebunk, Maine, a comparatively 
small-scale production of such goods, while conducting the ordi- 
nary business of custom wool-carding.! Establishments of this sort, 
where the proprietor worked by himself, or at least only with the 
assistance of his family or of one or two helpers, and where the 
product could have been intended only for the local market, were 
but little in advance of the purely handicraft shops of the colonial 
worsted industry. They now possessed or had access to a ma- 
chine for the carding operation and, in some cases, the new spin- 
ning machine; but surely they were not factories. 

However, it was around the recently acquired carding machine, 
or around the combination of this apparatus with the older fulling 
mill, that the larger establishments were destined to grow. One 
can find various cases in illustration. For example, the Hazards 
of South Kingston, Rhode Island, first purchased a half-interest 
in a fulling mill, then they added a carding machine, and after the 
break with England acquired further equipment for the complete 
manufacture of cloth.2, John Scholfield, Jr., erected a custom 
carding mill at Jewett City, Connecticut, in 1804 or 1805. Grad- 
ually he added other machinery, until at the close of the War of 
1812 he had a full complement of apparatus for the manufacture 
of wool cloths.* The Sawyer Woolen Mills of Dover, New Hamp- 
shire, arose in a similar manner, but at a considerably later period. 
In 1823 Alfred I. Sawyer commenced the business of carding and 
cloth-dressing, and nine years later added a single set of machin- 
ery for the manufacture of flannels.* Of course, other concerns, 
such as those of the Du Ponts at Brandywine, Maryland, and of 
Abraham Marland at North Andover, Massachusetts, apparently 
began at once with a complete mill equipment. Indeed, once the 


1 Remich, History of Kennebunk, pp. 237-241. Other instances are numerous: 
James Saunderson at New Ipswich, New Hampshire (Gould, History of New Ip- 
swich, p. 230); Arthur Scholfield at Pittsfield, Massachusetts; Albert Stone at 
Grafton, Massachusetts (Massachusetts Spy, August 3, 1814); Daniel Stearns at 
Pittsfield (Field, History of Pittsfield, p. 20), among others. 

2 Gammell, Life of Rowland G. Hazard, p. 7. 

3 Bagnall, p. 458. 

4 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 209. 


222 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


industry was on its feet in a given area, such was the normal 
procedure,—as might be expected. But during the period of in- 
cubation, so to speak, the process of growth was intermittent and 
slow, and cases of the gradual change from carding and fulling 
shops to full-fledged factories are sufficiently numerous to authen- 
ticate this course of development as the usual and natural one.! 
The halting development of these mills is further illustrated by 
the amount of custom work which they performed and the extent 
to which they employed workers outside their own walls. Besides 
the custom carding and fulling which one would of course expect 
of them, other operations were undertaken by the new enterprises 
for local patrons. The Abbotts, who bought the old Scholfield 
plant at Andover, seem only to have spun for customers, and 
Amena Braman of Dudley, Massachusetts, advertised only to 
card and spin for his patrons, perhaps because in neither case did 
these establishments have looms, or at least surplus weaving ca- 
pacity.2 More generally, however, the mills were ready to carry 
the manufacturing process as far as their patrons desired. Arthur 
Scholfield announced in 1810 that “ customers can have their wool 
made into Rolls, Roping, or Cloth, as best suits them.” * The 
proprietors of the Pittsfield and Housatonic factories at Pittsfield 


1 Other cases: Bagnall, pp. 229, 285-286, 424; Taft, pp. 44, 45; Puttsfield Sun, 
May 27, 1813; Abbott, Women in Industry, p. 46; Worcester Book, p. 91; Field, His- 
tory of Middlesex County, 1819, p. 59; Temple, History of Whately, Massachusetts, 
pp. 170-171; History of Androscoggin County, Maine, p. 385; Census of 1880, xx, 
389; North, Bulletin, 1899, pp. 215-216; American Woolen Company, Skeich of 
Mills, p. 108; Temple, History of Palmer, Massachusetts, p. 270; Larned, History of 
Windham County, Connecticut, ii, 539. 

Kayser in his Directory of 1823 seems to have caught the beginnings of factory 
development in Maine, long known as a state of many woolen mills. He writes 
(p. 58): the carding-fulling mills ‘‘ which abound in every part of the country,” be- 
sides carding machines and finishing apparatus, “‘occasionally likewise contain a 
spinning frame, and sometimes one or two looms.” 

2 This sort of activity on the part of the early mills has also been referred to in 
the discussion of the declining household manufacture (see above, p. 182) since 
it really lies intermediate between purely household and purely factory work. The 
importance of such action in the development of the factory warrants some further 
comment here. 

3 Bailey, Andover, p. 594; Massachusetts Spy, June 8, 1814. See also American 
Watchman, July 17, 1813; and Massachusetts Spy, June 21, 1815. 

4 Pittsfield Sun, May 9, 1810, and July 6, 1811. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 223 


advertised in 1814 that ‘‘arrangements are making to take in wool 
to card, spin, or weave on shares.””! Perhaps as typical a case as 
any is that revealed by an advertisement of 1808 with respect to a 
concern of New Hartford, New York: ? 


Jacob and Lewis Sherril have erected machines for picking, breaking, 
carding, and spinning wool. 

Picking, breaking, oiling, and carding — 8¢ lb. cash, or ro¢ credited. 

Spinning warp — 1o¢ a run; filling, 8¢. 

Will pay cash for wool, and keep on hand Yarn and Rolls. 

Will also Weave any width, from 5 to 10 quarters. 


In such devious ways, by carrying through various processes, by 
manufacturing on shares, and, in general, by supplementing and 
co6perating with the earlier household production, factories se- 
cured their start. Gradually they gathered the strength necessary 
to stand alone, especially through the growth of a market. This 
temporizing, it may be added, was not always a phenomenon of 
the first years in development alone. Not infrequently manufac- 
turers continued to lean somewhat upon the local demands for 
commission work or for production of cloth on shares, even after 
they had been able to establish a relatively wide market for their 
products. This was especially true of concerns located in country 
districts, where the practice of household manufacture persisted 
most tenaciously, and in periods of depression, when the general 
market requirements were curtailed. Moreover, as the industry 
moved westward, these phenomena were repeated. For example, 
the ‘‘new steam wool carding factory” of Lexington, Kentucky, 
announced in 1829 that it would card or spin on commission, as 
well as keep on hand a supply of fabrics, from the coarsest negro- 
cloth to the “‘finest (fabric) that can be made of the best Merino 


1 Pitisfield Sun, Juneg, 1814. Other instances: Oriskany Woolen Factory (Colum- 
bian Gazette, Utica, New York, May 28, 1811); Abner Cunningham (Orange County 
Gazette, Goshen, New York, September 6, 1814); factory at North-Killingworth, 
Connecticut (Middlesex Gazette, June 16, 1814); Stockbridge Woolen Factory 
(Pittsfield Sun, May 20, 1814). 

2 Utica Gazette (Utica, New York), July 26, 1808. 

Other cases of similar character: Documentary History of American Industrial 
Society, ii, 329-330; Spear, History of North Adams, pp. 73, 92; Sibley, History of 
Union, Maine, p. 109; Remich, History of Kennebunk, Maine, p. 249; Lippincott, 
History of Manufactures in the Ohio Valley, p. 75. 


224 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


wool.”?! But even in the eastern region, instances where the new- 
sprung factory as late as this was still catering to the needs of the 
local household manufacture are not wanting. 

To satisfy the other deficiency wherein the early factory failed 
of entire self-dependence and of the complete organization of the 
modern plant — the ‘“‘putting-out”’ of certain operations — con- 
tact was again had with the household industry. The factory al- 
ways contained the carding and finishing processes, and the spin- 
ning jenny or jack early formed part of its equipment. The jenny, 
to be sure, was not unknown to the household industry; but, for 
some reason, perhaps the impossibility of close control over the 
operation and a consequent greater unevenness in the yarn, spin- 
ning never (or almost never) seems to have been “put out” to 
household workers.” Not so, however, with weaving. Even John 
Scholfield, who had woven cloth himself and so was competent to 
supervise factory weaving, possessed no looms in his Stonington 
(Connecticut) mill. The woolen yarns of his production were 
woven on hand looms outside, either on his account or on that 
of individuals who had purchased yarn from him.* Dwight’s 
account of the mill started by Colonel Humphreys gives an equip- 
ment of only four broad and eight narrow looms for factory work, 
and states that ‘‘most of the weaving has been done in private 
families.”” 4 As late as 1827 it is reported of the Glenham (New - 
York) woolen factory that approximately thirty persons out of a 
total of one hundred and fifty were employed “without”’ the mill.5 

1 Documentary History of American Industrial Society, ii, 335. 

2 The Hartford factory appears to have sent out the wool to be spun (cf. above). 
Also Rowland Hazard once said in reminiscence of his early life, “‘In 1816 and later 
I used to employ scores of women to spin at their homes” (North, in Davis’s New 
England States, p. 204). ‘These are the only indications of such operations that I 
have found. Indeed, there is no hint of such work elsewhere. 

The reason I give for this situation might be criticized in the light of Eng- 
lish experience, where spinning was put out to household workers for many 
years. However, the weaving in that case, at least in Yorkshire, was in the 
hands of particularly skillful workers, the small “manufacturers.” They could 
make allowance for irregularities in the yarn when perhaps American weaveis, 
less well-trained, could not. 

3 Bagnall, p. 424. 

4 Dwight, Travels, ili, 392, 393. 

5 Niles, xxxiv, 76. 


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THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 225 


Finally, the extensive use of hand-loom weaving in the Philadel- 
phia district should be noted. The practice followed in that area 
of employing hand-loom weavers was begun in this period, and 
was occasioned probably by forces similar to those that caused its 
appearance elsewhere; but the long persistence of this practice in 
Philadelphia — that is, for a considerable time after 1830—gave 
that region subsequently something of a peculiar status.1_ While 
the evidence available does not indicate that weaving outside the 
walls of the factory was the prevailing method of production, it 
does show that this practice was by no means an uncommon affair 
until the middle twenties at least.2, The occasion of the decline in 
hand-loom weaving thereafter was the appearance and wider 
adoption of the power loom. Hand-loom weaving, if performed 
by skilled handicraftsmen, as was the case in Yorkshire, could 
compete with power-weaving, — at least until the mechanical 
loom had been substantially improved over its original form; but 
hand-weaving in the household, as occurred here, had to give way 
more quickly.? 

To summarize the general development, we may say: that the 
American woolen factory found its origin in carding-fulling mills 
frequently enough to suggest this course of evolution as the nor- 
mal one. With the custom business of these shops as a secure 
basis, manufacturing expanded, apparently at first only as a 
quasi-handicraft occupation, but soon on a broader scale. Yet 
the persistence of the household system of manufacture made ad- 
vantageous the retention, for a number of years, of a rather close 
connection with the needs of that production, — through the 
acceptance of commission work in various forms for the inhabit- 
ants of the surrounding country. Again, the factory did not at 

1 Wilson, Picture of Philadelphia, 1824, p.11; Niles, xxviii, 159; Freedley, Phila- 
delphia and its Manufactures, p. 233. 

2 Other cases of outside weaving: Taft, pp. 44, 45; Bagnall, p. 229; American 
W atchman (Baltimore, Maryland), August 21, 1813; Wheelock, in Chapin’s Address, 
Pp. 134-135; Bishop, ii, 207; Greene, Providence Plantations, p. 71; Niles, i, 292; 
Massachusetts Historical Society Collections, 2nd Ser., iii, 263; ““Petition of the 
Citizens engaged in manufactories on the Brandywine, December 9, 1815,” in 
Congressional Papers, 1806-1816. 


3 As to the English case, see Heaton, pp. 357-358; British Documents, 1840 
[43], p. 587; and Clapham, Bulletin, 1908, pp. 308-309. 


226 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


once acquire self-dependence, maintaining for some time, espe- 
cially in weaving, a reliance upon outside help. But the youthful 
establishments step by step gathered strength and breadth of 
action until by 1830, except in the more western parts of the 
country, they had attained a position not unlike that of more 
modern enterprises.’ 


2. The Source of Capital and the Course of Profits. 


The deficiency of capital was asserted by Gallatin to be “‘the 
only powerful obstacle” to the ‘“‘introduction and advancement 
of manufactures in America;’’? and in the wool-manufacturing 
industry too this scarcity was a deterrent upon a rapid extension 
of production. The gradual evolution of many factories suggests 
the difficulties in the situation. These mills apparently were ex- 
panded out of profits which were squeezed from the unfavorable 


1 General comparison of the course of development in the United States with 
that abroad cannot be made. For the most part information on the foreign de- 
velopment is scanty; and, besides, conditions differed much from area to area. 
Within England alone, the course of advance in the West of England seems to have 
varied much from that in Yorkshire. In the former region, a hesitant and gradual 
development such as that which came in the United States appears to have taken 
place, although it is not at all evident that the carding-fulling mills served the 
same purpose as in this country. For the Yorkshire district, the firm establishment 
of the handicraft operations — shops of the Yorkshire “‘clothiers” — made for a 
dissimilar evolution. As late as 1840, the organization in this region is described 
as follows: ‘‘All the processes to which the wool is submitted previous to that of 
spinning, are carried on in factories, called ‘scribbling and slubbing mills.’ The 
spinning of the yarn, and the weaving of the cloth, though sometimes carried on in 
factories (especially in the case of superfine cloths made in the town of Leeds), are 
generally performed in the cloth-maker’s family; whilst all the finishing processes 
subsequent to weaving . . . are completed in factories” (British Documents, 1840[43], 
p. 528). The ‘scribbling and slubbing mills’? would of course correspond roughly 
to our carding mills, though perhaps with the operation of roping or slubbing with 
the billy added. Incidentally, it is odd to find that some of these “‘scribbling and 
slubbing mills”? were put up and owned by groups of clothiers, who apparently had 
all their wool prepared at them. At the other end of the fabrication, stood the 
finishing “‘factories,’’ which probably were comparable with our fulling mills. 
But in between stood the independent clothier, who indeed clung long to his posi- 
tion. When real factories came, they apparently had to supersede the whole 
earlier organization. However, as already intimated, evidence is scarce respecting 
even this English development. 

2 State Papers, Finance, il, 430. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 2277 


market conditions of the times. But one wishes also to learn the 
source of those initial supplies of capital by means of which manu- 
facture was started. It is of course impossible to ascertain 
all the sources of these first increments, and especially to es- 
timate their respective contributions; yet there is opportu- 
nity to catch glimpses of the transfer of capital to the woolen 
industry. 

A considerable amount of capital was attracted to the youthful 
manufacture from foreign trade. The Hazards of South Kingston, 
Rhode Island, had long been interested in commerce, but grad- 
ually Rowland Hazard, the head of the family at the time, drew 
away from it, and began to pay attention, first, to carding and 
fulling, and later to wool manufacture also.! So also the Derby of 
Salem, Massachusetts, who brought over a large flock of merino 
sheep and soon after erected a factory, came from a prominent 
family of shipowners and traders.? -Here and elsewhere it is evi- 
dent that the capital amassed and the profits earned through the 
commercial ventures of the troubled period before 1815 were find- 
ing new employment. And the latter was to be found not only in 
the rising cotton manufacture, but in the still younger factory 
production of wool cloths.® 

In yet another way commercial capital found its way into the 
new industry, when firms that had been engaged in the import 
trade turned their eyes inland as their business hesitated and 
then halted in the period of troubled commerce. The Hartford 
factory had numbered among its important stockholders, George 
Phillips and Company and Peter Colt and Company, merchant 


1 Gammell, Life of Rowland G. Hazard, pp. 41-46. Hazard is said to have known 
nothing about the manufacture, and to have had to take a partner, Knowles, who 
superintended the operations (Bagnall, pp. 285-289). 

2 Bishop, ii, 195. 

3 Other instances: Providence Woolen Manufacturing Company, funds secured 
from “‘men possessed of capital,” presumably Providence traders (Field, State of 
Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, iii, 361); Newport capital in a Plainfield, 
Connecticut, mill (Larned, History of Windham County, Connecticut, ii, 427); Quad- 
dic Manufacturing Company of Thompson, Connecticut, capital from Rhode Island 
men of means (ibid., ii, 439). 

For cotton manufacture, see Clark, pp. 367-369; Copeland, Cotton Manufactur- 
ing Indusiry, pp. 3-5, 196. 


228 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


traders of the town.! The Merino Wool Factory Company, 
of Dudley, Massachusetts, similarly had included among its 
shareholders the Boston mercantile firm of French & Everett.? 
Arthur W. Magill, the prime mover in the Middletown 
(Connecticut) mill, had been interested in a wholesale import- 
ing store of that town.’ Indeed, the testimony of a British 
cloth exporter in 1828 was undoubtedly accurate; he said, 
‘“‘T know many respectable merchants in New York, Balti- 
more, and Boston, who used to be importers . . . who 
have turned their capital to manufacture the cloth in their 
own country.” 4 

From other lines of business, there were some contributions. 
Conspicuous among them are the examples of Du Pont in Dela- 
ware, who, after success in the manufacture of gunpowder, turned 
in 1811 to take advantage of the opportunities in the production 
of fine woolens and ultimately possessed three woolen factories; ® 
and of Samuel Slater, the early prosperous cotton manufacturer, 
who in 1814 became interested in wool-cloth production at Dud- 
ley, Massachusetts.® Less conspicuous, but probably as numer- 
ous as any of the foregoing (perhaps barring commercial capital) 
were the cases where farmers, like Delano Abbott, of Rockville, 
Connecticut, began the manufacture on a small scale out of their 
slender savings.’ 

Yet, as has been suggested, the profits accruing to the industry, 


1 Maine Historical Society, Collections, iv, 55-56. 

2 Ammidown’s Historical Collections, i, 436. 

3 Middlesex Gazette, March g, 1804. 

4 British Documents, 1828 [515], p. 43. The “managers” of the Middlesex 
Company of Lowell had been importers for many years (Awards and Claims, 
Exhibition of 1876, p. 187). 

5 Bishop, ii, 171. 

6 Ammidown’s Historical Collections, i, 468. Slater entered into partnership 
with one Edward Howard, an Englishman skilled in the woolen manufacture. In 
1824, the Village Factory, established in 1824 at Dudley, passed into Slater’s 
hands (ibid., i, 437). 

7 With regard to Abbott, see Burr, Connecticut Magazine, vi, 64. The 
Stevens mill at North Andover had as its original promotors local farmers and a 
country doctor. Again, a mill in West Cambridge (now Arlington), Massa- 
chusetts, was bought by the local tavern-keeper (History of Middlesex County, 
iil, 183). 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 229 


especially in the period of interrupted commerce and of rising 
prices, were as much responsible for the successful development 
of factories as the increments of capital flowing from outside 
sources. One could begin in a small way and build more widely 
out of earnings. And in fact the resources necessary to commence 
operations in the wool manufacture were by no means great. In 
one instance, an enterprise located at North Adams, Massachu- 
setts, the initial expenditure on plant was only $1100, — $300 for 
the water-power site and $800 for the construction of the mill.! 
This was probably about the minimum. However, if the start 
were made, as so frequently was the case, through the erection of 
a carding-fulling mill, the initial outlay of course could not have 
been considerable. Once started in such modest ways, the con- 
cern must rely on the profits in subsequent years to consolidate its 
position and expand its operations; and not infrequently in the 
early stages of the factory production of wool cloths, returns 
were high. A mill near Newport, Delaware, was reported in 1810 
by one close to the concern to have cleared 25 per cent annually 
on the capital employed.” Another at Danville, Pennsylvania, is 
said to have yielded 4o per cent.2 Nathaniel Stevens of North 
Andover apparently cleared five dollars on every piece (sixty 
yards) of flannel made at his mills.t In addition, there is negative 
evidence in the fact that no mill seems to have failed during 
the period before 1815. There is little likelihood, to be sure, that 
the mills throughout the country made earnings that averaged the 
figures above adduced. Yet unquestionably returns were good; 
and this circumstance assisted materially in the growth of the new 
enterprises. 

In subsequent years, in the period of readjustment that fol- 
lowed the peace and even in the twenties, profits were probably on 
a lower level, at times undoubtedly displaced by actual losses. 
Statements of extraordinary earnings cease to appear, and instead 
there are constant complaints to Congress—partly perhaps for 

4 Spear, History of North Adams, p. 73. 

2 National Intelligencer, August 6, 1810, quoting the Philadelphia Aurora. 

3 Warden, Account of the United States, ili, 268. 


4 Clark, p. 376; quoting Bagnall Papers. This refers to the year 1816, and pre- 
sumably profits were even higher in the earlier years. 


230 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


effect—of the peculiarly great difficulties in the wool manufac- 
ture. A concern in Walpole, Massachusetts, started in 1810 with 
a capital of $16,000 to $20,000, is said to have wholly exhausted 
its capital by 1817.1. A mill in South Kingston, Rhode Island, 
apparently that of the Hazards, is reported to have been run at a 
loss of 15 per cent in the decade 1814 to 1824.7, But seemingly 
conditions improved as the years went by. With the expansion of 
the domestic market, giving greater stability to the industry, and 
with the improvement in methods of manufacture, giving greater 
freedom from embarrassing importations, there is every proba- 
bility that such should have been the case. To be sure, there is 
evidence to the contrary. One factory in Delaware stated its 
profits to have been 12 per cent in the period 1815-1824, 8 per 
cent in 1824-1828, and 6 per cent in 1828-1831; and another 
manufacturer estimated in 1832 that all money up to that time 
invested in American woolen mills had been lost to the original 
owners.® But in the same document, McLane’s Report on Manu- 
factures, there are many cases of substantial profits in the years 
just preceding. The loss of the South Kingston mill above noted 
had been turned into a net gain of 1234 per cent in the years 1824 
to 1832. Satinet mills in Maine were said to yield 15 to 20 per 
cent, if properly conducted; and in several other cases earnings of 
IO Or 12 per cent were reported. The balance of the testimony 
clearly indicates a marked improvement in the industry in the 
latter part of the twenties and the beginning of the next decade. 
In other words, the data available as to profits suggest, as does 
information regarding technical development and marketing 
conditions, that by 1830 the industry was well established 

1 McLane’s Report on Manufactures, i, 396. 

2 Ibid., i, 964. 

8 Tbid., ii, 672; and i, 68. See also State Papers, Finance, v, 808 seqg., where 
several manufacturers at a tariff hearing in 1828 testified that they had been 
losing money. 

4 McLane’s Report, i, 23; and i, 290, 919, 1004, 10173 li, 69, 467. See also Clark, 
Pp. 377; and Congressional Documents, 27th Cong., 2nd Sess., House Report, No. 461, 
pp. 56-57. There is, of course, the probability that in some of these cases, in- 
sufficient deductions were made to cover depreciation and obsolescence. But 


one cannot gauge the genera] significance, at least in rates and percentages, of 
these faulty accounting practices. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 231 


in this country and had in good measure outlived those un- 
certainties of return which frequently accompany industrial 
immaturity. 


3. Business Organization. 


Discussion in the foregoing section has in part prepared us to 
appreciate the character of the typical business unit within the 
wool-manufacturing industry when the working of wool reached 
the factory basis. Concerns began usually as the enterprises of 
individuals, families, or at best of partnerships. David Humph- 
reys, Rowland G. Hazard, and Delano Abbott commenced opera- 
tions alone, as the Scholfields did also, apparently. Again, several 
members of the Du Pont family codperated in the establish- 
ment of the Brandywine mills that bore their name, while the 
Stevens enterprise at North Andover, Massachusetts, got its start 
when a small group of friends and neighbors joined forces in set- 
ting up a partnership. And the individual enterprise or partner- 
ship remained during the period to 1815 the typical business 
unit.? 

The joint-stock form, to be sure, put in an early appearance 
among wool-manufacturing concerns. For example, the Hartford 
mill of 1788 and the Newbury-Port Woollen Manufactory of 1794 
were chartered enterprises with divided ownership, as was also 
the Cecil Manufacturing Company of Maryland (1794). But on 
the whole the employment of this form was rare until after 1800.’ 
In the period of more rapid manufacturing development com- 
mencing after 1807 a larger use of incorporation began. Charters 
of concerns in the New England and middle states that gave 
“cotton and woolen goods” or merely “woolen goods”’ as the 
proposed production of their plants rose from three in 1807 to 


1 Davis in his Essays in the Earlier History of American Corporations 
(ii, 256) says: “In America, as in England, the great bulk of manufacturing 
enterprises, as they emerged from the household stage, were individual or 
partnership undertakings.”’ And I have seen no evidence to indicate that the 
manufacture of wool formed an exception. 

2 Davis (ii, 269) records only eight companies incorporated for manufacturing 
purposes of all sorts in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey 
before 1800. 


232 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


seventy-one in 1814.1 Then, too,—if we may judge from later 
experience,—there were some concerns organized on the joint- 
stock basis, although they were unincorporated.? On the other 
hand, the above enumeration is subject to various deductions. It 
is likely that many of these chartered companies never actually 
went into operation, and that many others in fact turned their 
efforts to cotton goods alone. Hence, the number of joint-stock 
enterprises in the period 1807-1814 with which we are directly 
concerned was small indeed. 

The trend, however, was already clear. Succeeding years 
showed a gradually expanding use of the joint-stock form, al- 
though, because of the relatively small size of some woolen mills, 
the individually owned enterprise and the partnership establish- 
ment continued to play a large part in the American wool manu- 
facture. This situation is evident in McLane’s Report of 1832. 
One of the prearranged questions which were submitted to manu- 
facturers was the character of ownership, and some fifty replies 
are recorded. Of these mills twenty-three indicated the joint- 
stock form, and thirty-four the private or partnership form, — or 
ratios not far from one-third and two-thirds.* The course of a 
particular Massachusetts enterprise is suggestive of the general 


1 The tabulation by states during these years is as follows: 
1807 1808 1809 1810 =s-:«z T8111 1812 1813 1814 1815 


NEL seu eee Sie I I 5 3 5 3 9 I 
Massie. toe ae ee ee ¢) fi 3 8 15 24 15 
Conte eral e it we ae ae 2 I 7 6 
VE ee are eerie 2 I 3 4 war: 3 2 4 2 
Ni Vale eke ee 5,3 ne 3 6 13 13 19 24 9 
NG Jt tee hee ee ve A rr Ay St Ae I 2 I 
Pac matrdrsebe I ah I 2 
Me Orie eae ire I I 2 I 

‘Lotal eeu ane a 3 II 16 22 32 43 qI 38 


(State Papers, Finance, iv, 397-420.) 
It should also be noted that the proportion of these enterprises that gave the 
manufacture of woolen goods alone as the purpose of their formation was not high, 
perhaps a quarter. 

2 McLane gives several cases of enterprises which in 1832 were reported as 
“joint, but not incorporated” (Report, ii, 62, 64). 

3 McLane’s Report, passim. Rhode Island is reported (i, 974) to hold nineteen 
mills of which six were joint-stock and the rest private. No information is avail- 
able for the important group of Massachusetts mills. Apparently the local agents 
failed to insist upon an answer to this stock inquiry. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 238 


movement. One James Shepherd began the manufacture of wool 
in Northampton in 1809. A year later a charter was secured as 
the Northampton Cotton and Woollen Manufacturing Company; 
but the enterprise was never organized as a “‘company.”’ Messrs. 
Thomas, James, and Charles Shepherd carried on the business as 
a family affair through the war, although using the name of com- 
pany always. Subsequently James Shepherd bought the concern, 
and continued its operations either as “‘sole owner partner”’ or in 
copartnership with one James M. Robbins. These men were in- 
duced by the satisfactory trade of the times “to employ a larger 
capital and extend their business;’’ and subsequently, after a 
period of difficulty under the tariff of 1824, the establishment 
came under the control of a joint-stock company and was so con- 
ducted thereafter. Larger capital and expanding operations 
brought the advantage of joint ownership.! 

This trend toward joint-stock ownership is significant for our 
purpose. It suggests the growing scale of manufacturing opera- 
tions in the industry, and the increasing general confidence in the 
industry. The basis was available upon which could be reared 
the strikingly large enterprises of later years. Yet at the period of 
the twenties and early thirties, too much emphasis might easily 
be given this phenomenon. Form of business unit was as yet no 
decisive indication of size and importance. Probably there was 
often little difference in scope of operations between the individual 
or partnership and the joint-stock enterprise. Subsequent dec- 
ades were to see the more striking developments. It suffices for 
the present to note that a commencement had already been made 
by 1830. 


4. Labor Supply. 


To appreciate the early conditions in the American wool manu- 
facture, a knowledge of the sources and composition of the labor 
supply is as important as that of the sources and earnings of cap- 
ital. Information here is, if anything, scarcer than with regard to 
capital, and, partly on account of the wider distribution of the 
wool-working industry, it is less abundant in connection with 


1 McLane’s Report, i, 310-311. 


234 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


that manufacture than with respect to the kindred manufacture 
of cotton. 

There is evidence that mill-owners in the early wool manufac- 
ture had difficulties in gathering a working force and enticing it 
within the factories, as was the case also in the early cotton in- 
dustry. A small contingent of woolen workers, to be sure, and an 
important contingent, was available in the foreign artisans who 
had come or had been induced to come to this country. A group 
of them — men who like the Scholfields had early set up a quasi- 
handicraft manufacture of woolens— has already been men- 
tioned. Not infrequently others are spoken of. At Colonel 
Humphreys’s mill, an Englishman, who, it is said, had come from 
Lancashire for the purpose, had charge of all the processes of 
manufacture.! The factory at Steubenville, Ohio, “had the ad- 
vantage of a few skilled foreign workmen;”’ and so too the mills 
at Oriskany, New York, and elsewhere.” It was said in 1810 that 
“the convulsions of Europe have driven hither every description 
of artist employed in the woolen manufactory;” while Tench 
Coxe, writing in 1814, summarized that ‘‘no branch of manufac- 
tures receives so great an accession of foreign workmen as the 
woolen branch, because the raw material and manufacture are 
universal in Europe.” * Unquestionably such men, placed in po- 
sitions of responsibility in the new mills, would have influence in 
the improvement of operation far in excess of their numbers, both 
directly and through the training of other workmen. 

Yet despite the presence of these artisans, the greater part of 


1 North, in Davis’s New England States, i, 205. 

In the Hartford venture, it will be recalled, the proprietors were reported by 
Henry Wansey to be wholly dependent for the technical side of the business upon 
an Englishman, a skillful sorter (Bagnall, p. 207). 

2 Niles, xxi, 367; Capron, Bulletin, 1881, p. 127; Bagnall, p. 234. 

3 National Intelligencer, August 6, 1810; Siate Papers, Finance, ii, 679. See also 
Niles, x, 82; and Carey, Appeal to Common Sense, p. 54. The Wolcott Woolen 
Manufacturing Company at its start in 1816 is said to have employed “mostly 
foreigners”? (Ammidown’s Historical Collections, ii, 370). See also State Papers, 
Finance, iii, 104. The character of these workers is reported by one writer as fol- 
lows: ‘‘. . . generally English operatives, who, as a class, were ignorant about all 
things but their trade of weaving, and much inclined to intemperance, which in- 
troduced a class of population about each establishment noways creditable to 
morals or respectable society”? (Ammidown, i, 493). 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 235 


the operatives had to be secured from the native population, and 
here manufacturers met difficulties. Appreciation of the obstacles 
in this field was apparently responsible for that method whereby 
legislatures (e. g., Connecticut) sometimes extended aid to the 
young industry: the exemption from the poll tax for a certain 
number of years of all workmen in wool manufactories. To speak 
more specifically: the Hartford factory, although the scale of its 
operations was not extensive, was reported to have been to 
‘““heavy expense in procuring and retaining workmen who had 
competent skill in the different branches of Woolen Manufac- 
ture,’ and had been compelled to ‘‘raise up an entirely new set of 
workmen from amongst our own Youth, at a heavy expense.” ! 
And the emphasis placed on skilled foreign workers suggests that 
similar trials confronted later manufacturers in greater or less de- 
gree. Again, it was difficult to secure an adequate number of 
children. According to Dwight, “‘discreet parents” at the start 
of Colonel Humphreys’s mill were reluctant to place their children 
within the factory; ” and apparently as one result of this situa- 
tion, Colonel Humphreys sought pauper apprentices, just as the 
early English cotton manufacturers had done before him. At one 
time he got seventy-three boys from the New. York Almshouse, 
and others from nearby villages, all being duly bound under the 
form of indenture.’ In other localities the same difficulty seem- 
ingly was no less considerable; for frequently in contemporary 
newspapers appeared advertisements of mills in search of appren- 
tices, usually boys twelve to fifteen years old.* 

Another method of securing labor, and one widely employed, 
was that of hiring whole families, with the provision that the fam- 
ilies should contain a number of children. Usually these families 
occupied the company houses, and each member found a place in 
the mill. Illustrative of this means of procuring employees is 
an advertisement that appeared in a Baltimore newspaper: 

1 Bagnall, pp. 103-104. 2 Dwight, Travels, ili, 393. 

Bagnall p. 357. 

4 Middlesex Gazette, June 27, 1811 and November 14, 1811, June 16, 1814 and 
June 23, 1814; Pittsfield Sun, June 9, 1814, July 14, 1814, and August 31, 1815; 


The Bee (Hudson, New York), August 9, 1814; American Watchman (Baltimore, 
Maryland), August 21, 1813. 


236 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


‘“Wanted: several families who have a number of children who 
can be employed in a factory. Such families will be furnished 
with convenient accommodation on application at the Madi- 
son factory.” + This method, moreover, freed the proprietor 
from the supervision which was necessary for large bodies of 
‘‘apprentices.”’ 

Yet the evidence available does not point to a mere exploitation 
of this child labor. The sentiment of the times was distinctly in 
favor of the employment of children. As Niles said, they are 
thereby ‘‘inured to habits of industry, order, and regularity, 
which generally adheres to them through life.” Moreover, the 
welfare of the apprentices was given special consideration, at 
least by Colonel Humphreys, and probably elsewhere. Some- 
what the same attitude that led Samuel Slater to the establish- 
ment of the first Sunday Schools in Rhode Island, led Colonel 
Humphreys to seek legislative protection for the children in 
woolen mills. At his instance the legislature of Connecticut 
passed a law requiring the proprietors of such establishments not 
only to supervise the morals of their workmen, but also to educate 
the children ‘‘as other children in plain families throughout the 
state are educated.”’ And Dwight remarks that, as far as Humph- 
reys’s mill was concerned, the “‘discreet parents” who had earlier 


1 American Watchman, March 23, 1814. See also same for April 26, 1815. 
Other cases are not infrequent. 

An interesting document indicating the conditions in both branches of the tex- 
tile industry at the time is a contract made at the Oxford Cotton Mill in which 
Samuel Slater was interested: 

Oxford, March to, 1815. 

This certifies I Cyrus Logee have this day contracted to move my family to 
Slater and Tiffany’s factory in Oxford consisting of My Son Duty Logee and Stephen 
and to furnish two other efficient Girls to heel or tend Twister for the term of one 
year from the first of April next ensuing and to occupy the Tenement in common 
with William Clark, upon the following terms (Viz.) myself to work in the Carding 
Room at any part they Judge the most proper @ 5/ per day. Oldest son Spin on 
mule @ 4/ per day. Second son Spin or work in Carding Room @ 7/6 per Week 
and the Girls are to have 13/ each per week for the term of one year. 

His 
William Clark. Cyrus X. Logee 


(Records of S. Slater and Sons Company.) Mark. 


2 Niles, xvii, 89. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 237 


kept their children out of the factories, later offered them ‘“‘in 
more than sufficient numbers.”’ ! 

Indeed, the situation at Derby under Colonel Humphreys’s 
administration has an idyllic cast, at least on the surface. Model 
tenements were erected for the employees, gardens were main- 
tained to supply them with vegetables, and workmen were dis- 
charged for immorality.” Here, and elsewhere, the hiring of whole 
families was regarded as particularly desirable, since other 
workers could be induced to live with them, — to the improve- 
ment of moral health.’ 

The utilization of children, however, though a feature of the 
early wool manufacture, was by no means a predominant factor 
in that industry. Indeed, there was in reality less need for chil- 
dren there than in many other industries of the time. The work- 
ing of wool was rather noteworthy for the large proportion of 
adult male labor. The chief reliance in the early mills for the 
sorting, carding, spinning, weaving, and some of the finishing 
operations was upon such labor, both for the actual work and for 
superintendence. Women could be employed as helpers in some of 
these processes, and in repair of defects in the completed fabric. 
Children were used for the most part also as assistants, especially 
in the spinning process, and even more particularly in the opera- 
tion of the billy. Work generally was too arduous or required too 
much skill for the employment of women and children as respon- 
sible machine tenders.*’ The Census figures of 1820, fragmentary 

1 Travels, ili, 393. 

Another observer stated: “‘The apprentices appear extremely well satisfied with 
their condition, being well fed, clothed, and lodged, like the members of a well 
regulated and happy family” (Bagnall, p. 356). 

2 Dwight’s Travels, iii, 393. 

3 Massachusetts Historical Society Collections, 2nd Ser., ili, 264; Records of 
S. Slater & Sons Company. 

4 Niles pointed out: ‘‘The manufacture of wool is less adapted to the labor of 
women and children than that of cotton .. . male spinners, weavers, dyers, fullers, 
shearers, etc., etc.” (xii, 277). 

Slater wrote in 1827: ‘‘There is less young help in the woollen than in the cotton 
manufactures;” and again: ‘“‘The wool business requires more man labour” 
(White, Memoir of Samuel Slater, pp. 128, 131). On the other hand, Carey gives 


an instance of a satinet mill of 1822 which employed ‘‘about 27 adults and 25 
children” (Crisis, p. 24). 


238 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


as they are, demonstrate this great reliance on adult male labor. 
In the Massachusetts factories for which data are given, the 
averages among employees were: twelve men, seven women, and 
six children; in New York mills, twelve men, two women, eight 
children; and for the country as a whole, nine men, three women, 
and six children.t But such relationships were typical only of the 
earlier factories. Technical changes in the next decade were to 
produce substantial changes, both as regards the employment of 
children and with respect to the proportions between men and 
women. 

The adoption of the Goulding card was a potent force in the 
reduction of the number of children employed in the woolen 
mill. By the elimination of the roping billy, the province of 
children was narrowed to that of helpers in the several processes, 
especially spinning. Whereas the maintenance and elaboration 
of the drawing and spinning operations caused the continued 
employment of child labor in the cotton and worsted manu- 
factures, the obviation of drawing through the use of the 
Goulding device spelled the decline of such labor in the woolen 
industry. 

The adaptation of woolen spinning to power, on the other hand, 
did not occasion any significant change in the type of labor em- 
ployed, since the work was still too arduous and skillful for 
women. ‘This was especially true of the early spinning-jacks in 
which some of the movements — the recession of the carriage, for 
example — continued to be manual operations. ‘The only ex- 
ception to this situation was in the case of the Brewster machine. 
Here, as was brought out by Colonel Shepherd in the inquiry of 
1828, girls could replace the more highly paid men.” But the 
Brewster apparatus was never widely used. 

In the weaving process, the introduction of power looms had 
effected greater change than had come from improvements in the 
spinning operation. One manufacturer said in 1828, “‘ We do not 


1 Tn the case of the larger concerns, a somewhat similar ration obtained: 


Men ar eA 46 31 4I 460 = 42 Average 
Women .. 27 23 20 13 TO Satomi 
Children . . 40 23 19 16 a5 = 24 


2 State Papers, Finance, v, 814. 


THE RISE OF, FACTORY PRODUCTION 239 


pay as much now for weaving as formerly, since the power loom 
has been introduced, and we now employ women, instead of men, 
to do the work.”’! And, indeed, the substitution of women seems 
to have been quite frequent.” The strenuous work of operating 
the harnesses and “‘beating-up”’ the cloth as it was woven was 
now obviated; and it is probable that the change to the produc- 
tion of lower-grade fabrics was not without effect. In the manu- 
facture of the finer goods, such as broadcloths, men were still 
necessary, — even as today the male weavers still have an impor- 
tant place in the weaving of similar fabrics, — but in the produc- 
tion of satinets, negro-cloths, and the like, the work could be 
satisfactorily attended to by female weavers. 

Finally, by the improvement of the finishing operations, some 
small increase in the employment of women was possible. After 
the introduction of mechanical shearing machines, for instance, it 
was stated: ‘One superintendent. and seven girls attend to 
twenty pair of shears;’’? and perhaps, too, in the case of the cy- 
lindrical napping and pressing machines, a few additional women 
might be employed. But in all these processes, the handling of 
heavy rolls of cloth was an obstacle to the wide use of female 
labor. While economizing in the employment of men, these im- 
provements in finishing did not, generally speaking, lead to any 
considerable substitution of women for men. 

The result of these various innovations is apparent in the sta- 
tistics of labor presented in the inquiries of 1828 and 1832. In the 
hearings before the Committee on Manufactures in 1828, seven 
manufacturers representing the leading concerns of the country 
gave definite accounts of their labor forces. The 735 employees 
contained in these establishments were divided into 41.4 per cent 
each of men and women, and 17.2 per cent of children.* In 1832, 


1 State Papers, Finance, p. 822. 

2 Tbid., p. 808; Massachusetts Spy, July 5, 1826; Niles, xxxiii, 141. The employ- 
ment of hand-loom weavers in and about Philadelphia, which persisted for many 
years, presumably gave a different complexion to the industry in that center, since 
most of these weavers were men. 

3 State Papers, Finance, v, 814. 

4 Ibid., pp. 809-831. In two other cases, the proportion of women was appar- 
ently even greater: in one, the manufacturer stated that he employed “mostly” 


240 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


the mills of Massachusetts, for which the reports seem quite full 
and accurate, the ratios were: 42 per cent of men, 49 per cent of 
women, and 8 per cent of children. In short, as compared with 
conditions of 1820, a substantial change in the composition of the 
normal labor force had occurred. Adults had become, as Niles 
remarked at the time, ‘‘always numerous in and about woolen 
factories.”’ 2 Women had reached a place at least of equality with 
men, while the utilization of children had shrunken decisively. 
The proportion. of women is of particular interest. It marks in 
fact the high-water level in the use of such labor in the American 
woolen industry, and reflects probably the condition of labor at 
that time in the United States, especially the scarcity of adult 
male labor. Subsequently, the proportion of women in woolen 
mills tended to become lower. 

The substitution of women for men was of special advantage to 
the woolen manufacturers by reason of the marked spread be- 
tween the wage scales of men and women. From the evidence of 
manufacturers at the inquiry in 1828, it appears that the wages of 
men in the mills averaged around $20 to $25 per month, or $4.50 
to $5.50 a week. Women and girls, on the other hand, received 
only about half that amount, — from $2.50 to $3.00 a week. In 
the investigation of 1832, approximately the same situation ap- 
pears: men in the Massachusetts factories averaged around go 
cents a day, while women secured only 4o cents.’ Occasionally 
piece rates took into account the sex of the worker. Thus, Abra- 
ham Marland said in 1828, “‘If I hire females to weave, I pay 83 
cents for what I pay men $1.00;”’ and the Amesbury (Massachu- 
women. The average for the seven mills was 44 men, 44 women, and 16 children. 


In the seven concerns for which definite figures were presented, there was consider- 
able variation. ‘Three mills, for example, reported as follows: 


Men Lars ERE’ 30 60 
WiOMmen aiken awEas I5 104 
Children . . 4 25 36 


1 McLane’s Report, i, 66-577. 

2 Niles, xxxli, 226. 

3 Rates of wages for men and women in Massachusetts woolen mills ran from 
60 cents to $1.33, and from 31 cents to 83 cents, respectively. Some of these wide 
variations are explicable probably by the fact that table board or other factors 
often entered into the matter. 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 241 


setts) flannel mills had a weave rate for women only half that 
for men.’ The adoption of improved machinery, then, had an 
important indirect influence toward the cheapening of Amer- 
ican wool fabrics and adding to the competitive strength of the 
domestic industry, — that is, an influence beyond the direct con- 
tribution to productive power. Women with lower wage scales 
could be substituted in appreciable degree for the higher paid men. 
At the same time, through the diminution in the proportion of 
child workers, a distinct social advantage was gained? 

The picture of labor.conditions in the early wool manufacture 
would not be complete, however, without a brief notice of at least 
two further matters: some peculiar relations between wage- 
earners and the mills, and the hours of labor. Of the former, 
some mention has already been made, particularly with regard to 
Colonel Humphreys’s establishment, one of the first mills. The 
conditions there suggested seem to have continued to prevail 
throughout the period under consideration. Woolen mills, being 
attracted to water-power sites, were usually located some dis- 
tance from the larger towns, and in the little communities that 
subsequently grew up, the factory was always the center of the 
village. Then, an important adjunct to the mill was the company 
store, at which claims acquired by work in the factory — money 
wages often being dispensed with — were convertible into con- 
sumable goods. The situation at Oriskany, New York, is typical. 


1 State Papers, Finance, v, 820; Niles, xxxiii, 141. 

2 The higher wage rates for adult male weavers were compensated in some 
measure by higher productivity. Not only could they turn out a larger volume 
of goods, but they would produce more perfect cloth. Moreover, they could prob- 
ably assist in mounting the warp in the loom and could handle the heavy rolls 
of completed fabric. Yet the spread of wages was so great that some net gain 
must have accrued to the industry through the employment of women weavers. 

8 Discussion of the prevailing rates of wages might be included except for the 
fact that per se they are of little significance. The rates themselves are not always 
uniform, sometimes including board and sometimes not; they were probably often 
affected by the policy of the company store; and of course they were subject to the 
general movements in the value of money. Moreover, dissimilarity of conditions 
would make an international comparison of questionable value, even if foreign 
figures were obtainable. It has been thought unwise to go into this subject further 
than to show relative wages of men and women, the influence of improved ma- 
chinery upon wage scales, and the like, — features scattered through the text. 


242 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


According to the account given in 1828, “‘a large proportion of the 
labor at the factory has heretofore been paid at the company’s 
store. The company keeps a general dry goods and grocery store, 
and has sold to the laborers at the usual profit of country trad- 
ing stores. . . . The practice is, to give the laborer a due bill, 
which is current at some of the neighboring stores for goods, as 
well as at the company’s store, which bills are redeemed at the 
factory in their cloths. The company does not pay any more 
cash for labor than formerly. The agreement with the hands, 
generally, is to pay one-half cash.’”?! Other concerns were not so 
liberal as this in all respects. For example, the Slater mill at 
Webster usually included in its wage agreements a clause to the 
following effect: ‘“‘and I further promise and agree that I will not 
trade, or make purchases, at any store whatsoever, during the 
above period”’ except at the stores ‘‘belonging to Mr. Slater.’’ ? 
In this manner, in common with most manufacturing establish- 
ments of the period, the woolen mills acted as purveyors for their 
employees, —frequently at a substantial profit to themselves.® 
Another point in the close relations of factory and worker was 
the arrangement whereby “‘board”’ was provided the'latter. Four 
of the manufacturers who appeared before the Committee on 
Manufactures in 1828 supplied board for their employees, and 
another for his apprentices.* In others, like the Slater plant at 
Webster, only a portion of the workers were taken care of in this 
way, although it appears that in this case the factory secured 
certain fixed rates from local boarding houses.® By this means, as 


1 State Papers, Finance, v, 810. 

2 Records of S. Slater and Sons Company, e. g., “Agreement of March 24, 1831 
with one William F. Knapp.” 

3 Note that the Oriskany company sought “‘the usual profit of country trading 
stores.”’ It may also be noted that the proprietor of the Steubenville (Ohio) mill 
counted among his advantages ‘‘an extensive well-assorted retail store, where we 
sell and barter goods to the amount of $30,000 or $40,000 per annum” (State Papers, 
Finance, v, 823). 

4 State Papers, Finance, v, 815, 817, 819, 831. 

5 See, for instance, a contract of slightly later date: ‘‘I hereby agree to work for 
Saml. Slater & Sons from this date to rst April 1837 at wool sorting and am to have 
$16.66 per month boarding myself, it is understood I am to be furnished with board 
at 10/6 per week. Dec. 3d, 1836, Webster. Oliver M. Russ.” 

The company received payment from a man who ran a boarding house and he 


THE RISE OF FACTORY PRODUCTION 243 


well as by the medium of the mill store and by the usual practice 
among early mills of housing part or all of their employees in 
. “company”’ tenements, the life of the early factory operatives 
was controlled by the ‘“‘company”’ to a much greater extent than 
it has been in later decades. 

The working days in the early woolen mills strike the modern 
observer as extraordinarily long, but in fact they were the com- 
mon duration of factory hours at that period, not only in other 
American industries, but also in English woolen mills. This 
matter formed one of the stock questions in the inquiry of the 
Committee on Manufactures in 1828, and so plenty of evidence 
on this point relative to the American wool-manufacturing indus- 
try of that date is available. Representative replies are as 
follows: “‘We expect to get sixty-eight hours per week, the year 
round, and this is all we insist on;”’ ‘‘In the summer time we 
work twelve hours, over and above the time allowed for meals, 
and we fall but little short of that in the Winter;”’ and “‘In the 
Summer we begin to work at about sun-rise, and continue until 
about sun-set, allowing half an hour for breakfast, and from one 
hour to one and a half hours for dinner. In the Winter we begin 
as soon as possible after light, and work until about nine o’clock 
at night, allowing about half an hour for meals.’’! But surely 
not all was pure exploitation. As a curious contrast, and illus- 
trating again the closeness of the factory to the life of its em- 
ployees, is the statement of another manufacturer: “The 
strictest attention is paid to the order, morals, and general 
conduct of every person about the establishment,” and “‘it is 
made the duty of the boys to attend Sunday School, otherwise 
to be discharged.’’? 

In short, the early woolen factory was the center of a pater- 
nalistic system. The worker spent all or nearly all the daylight 
hours within the mill; he lived in the company houses; he fre- 
quently boarded at company establishments or houses controlled 
by the company; he traded at the company store; and to some 


was in turn authorized to charge certain rates. In 1834, the rate per week for 
men was os. od. and for women 7s. 3d. (Records of S. Slater & Sons Company.) 
1 State Papers, Finance, v, 821, 819, 817. 
*Jb1d., p. 823. 


244 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


extent he found even his morals supervised by the company. The 
situation was not beneficent in all respects, but on the other hand 
it was not without some good points. For our purposes, to recog- 
nize it as the normal situation in this, the early stage of the 
American wool manufacture, is sufficient.? 


1 The acquisition and training of a factory force was itself not always a simple 
and unruffled affair. Occasionally there were outbreaks. Such for example is the 
suggestion of a rather picturesque advertisement in a Baltimore newspaper: the 
Madison Woolen factory states that “‘a few of our weavers through ignorance mis- 
taking impudence for independence and licentiousness for liberty, have been the 
cause of our loosing not only what we were willing to part with (themselves) but 
also a number of the opposite character;” and accordingly places were open to the 
proper applicants (American Watchman, January 29, 1814). Again, there were 
occasional disturbances in opposition to the installation of power looms (Ammi- 
down’s Historical Collections, i, 493; ii, 371; North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 278; Brief 
Record of the Hamilton Woolen Co., p. 1); and there was a ‘‘combination” of the 
hand-loom weavers of Philadelphia (Niles, xxviii, 159). Apparently, however, 
much of the trouble may be traced to the presence of foreign workmen, whose 
character, as already noted, was apparently not high. As yet there was of course 
neither labor organization nor labor troubles in the modern sense. 


CHAT LER XI 
THE FACTORY IN 1830 


1. Volume and Geographical Distribution of Factory Production. 


THE problem of estimating quantity of production in the days 
when reliable statistics were few and far between is a difficult one. 
No Federal census of manufactures goes as far back as 1830; state 
censuses supply figures for only two or three limited areas; and 
the general estimates of contemporary observers are often con- 
flicting in whole or in part. And yet various questions relating to 
the volume of domestic factory manufacture, hitherto avoided, 
press for consideration: the absolute growth in factory production 
during the early decades of the nineteenth century; the extent of 
this production in 1830 as compared with household production; 
and proportions in domestic consumption of wool fabrics supplied 
respectively by factory production, household manufacture, and 
importation. Such problems must be tackled; and despite the 
shortcomings of the existing data, there is sufficient evidence, I 
believe, to give us an approximately correct view concerning 
these matters. 

The number of factories established in the period prior to 1807— 
1808 is small, indeed, even if one should include enterprises which, 
properly speaking, were only handicraft shops. They would not 
exceed six or eight concerns at best.! From that time on, how- 
ever, mills were organized with considerable rapidity. The Census 
of 1810, though admittedly Incomplete, gave in all twenty-four 
wool manufactories, turning out some 200,000 yards of cloth 
annually. The size of these concerns Is suggested by the number 
of persons employed: in the various mills reported by the Census, 
it ran from eight to twenty-nine. A better view of the growth in 
the first boom period of the industry is gained from a considera- 
tion of the situation at the close of the War of 1812, — since the 


1 T have listed in Appendix B the early mills of which I have record. 
245 


246 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


year 1810 falls in the middle of the movement.’ By 1816, Con- 
necticut alone was credited with twenty-five woolen factories, 
which could manufacture 375,000 yards of narrow or 125,000 
yards of broadcloth per year.” Six establishments in Delaware 
were said to be driven by the waters of the Brandywine; and the 
Census of New Jersey in 1814 reported fifty-six woolen factories, 
scattered pretty generally throughout the state.* Similar progress 
was made in Massachusetts and New York, if one may judge from 
the number of separate enterprises of which information is avail- 
able. Taking the country as a whole, the Committee on Com- 
merce and Manufactures estimated that in 1816, $12,000,000 of 
capital was invested in the domestic wool manufacture, from 
which issued a volume of goods valued at $19,000,000. By this 
manufacture, moreover, 50,000 persons were said to be employed 
“constantly,” and as many more “‘occasionally,’’ — the latter 
presumably referring to household weavers who took out work 
from time to time. These latter figures, however, are probably 
much exaggerated, though one is at a loss to tell by exactly what 
measure. The best possible conclusion is that the industry had 
unquestionably shown marked expansion during the Embargo 
and war periods. 

The progress between this earlier period and 1830 is no less 
difficult to estimate. Data upon the value of wool manufactures, 
the number of persons employed, or the amount of capital in- 
vested are all unsatisfactory. Some are mere guesses by indi- 
viduals, such as Bishop’s statement that the volume of capital 
invested in the industry rose from 10 to 50 millions between 


1 Reference has already been made to the number of incorporations in the chief 
New England and middle Atlantic States of concerns which mentioned wool 
among the articles that they proposed to manufacture. 

The totals for the several years 1807-1815 ran as follows: 1807, 3; 1808, 3; 
1809, 11; 1810, 16; 1811, 22; 1812, 32: 1813, 435 TSI4 ge eee: 

These figures also do not include partnerships which at that time were appar- 
ently an important form of business organization in this industry. (Cf. above, 
Pp. 231-233.) 

2 State Papers, Finance, iii, 104; but the New York Columbian reported 14 
woolen factories in New London county alone (Niles, viii, 291). 

3 Niles, ix, 95; zbid., viii, 151. 

4 State Papers, Finance, iii, 104. 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 24'7 


1815 and 1827." Other data lack homogeneity between dates in 
the two general periods. One is driven to attempting comparison 
on the basis of the amount of wool consumed. The nature of the 
information available compels a comparison of 1810 with 1830, 
although, as indicated above, the former is not the most useful 
date for our purpose, — it falls in the midst of the early develop- 
ment. And there are other objectionable features to the basis 
chosen.” Still, as far as statistics are concerned, one is here tread- 
ing on surer ground than when he is considering capital and the 
like; and a comparison of 1830 with 1810 will offer some picture 
of the general progress. 

The Census of 1810 reported a production of wool cloths in 
American factories amounting to 200,000 yards: and on account 
of the few mills then existing, one may perhaps accept that figure 
as approximately correct. The total wool consumption, then, 
would be around 400,000 pounds, on the assumption that two 
pounds of raw wool were required for each yard of cloth.? But the 
estimate for the period around 1830 is not so readily secured. We 
have no information concerning factory production of cloth, and 
so must resort to a more roundabout method of estimate. The 
wool clip of the country according to Wright was 30 to 32 million 
pounds in 1830, to which 1% to 2 million pounds of wool available 
for the cloth manufacture were added by importation.* The pro- 
portion of foreign wool employed in the cloth manufacture, all of 
which was probably wrought up in the factories, to the total 

1 Bishop, ii, 314. 

2 Other objections are concerned with the adequacy of wool consumption as a 
test of real productivity. A change in the nature of the wool consumed, with a 
change in the degree of shrinkage, would affect the situation; a given increase in 
wool consumed might mean a greater increase in cloth turned out. Again, the 


adoption of cotton warps or of new and lighter-weight fabrics would mean greater 
yardage per pound of raw wool. 

3 Fabrics at the time averaged much heavier than they do now, perhaps around 
ten ounces per running yard three-fourths (or twenty-seven inches) wide. But 
this is ten ounces of wool in the cloth. To make allowance for shrinkage in scour- 
ing and for losses in manufacturing, one must assume a raw wool basis of around 
two pounds for each ten ounces of finished cloth. 

4 Wright, p. 75. Importations averaged at this time around 2,500,000 pounds of 
which I have estimated three-fifths to four-fifths to have been of the type usable in 
the production of woolen fabrics, the rest going into carpets, hats, knit-goods, etc. 


248 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


amount of raw material so wrought was variously estimated by 
contemporaries. Some of the manufacturers who testified at the 
inquiry of 1828 stated that they used a quarter of imported wool, 
some as much as a half! But these ratios are undoubtedly far 
above the average. The sponsors were in the main eastern men, 
proprietors of establishments of relatively large size, and pro- 
ducers of fine goods, — men such as Colonel James Shepherd of 
Northampton, Massachusetts, and Aaron Tufts of Dudley. Man- 
ufacturers located elsewhere — in New York State, as also Mr. 
Dickinson of Steubenville, Ohio, and even Messrs. Du Pont of 
Delaware, except in their cheapest goods — used little or no for- 
eign staple. Estimates indicating small use of foreign wool are 
available from other sources. The able memorial of the citizens 
of Boston, presented to Congress in 1827, said that ‘the manu- 
facturers are supplied almost to the full extent of their demands 
by domestic wool,” and placed the ratio of imported material at 
4 or 5 percent. Similarly a memorial of the New York Chamber 
of Commerce put the proportion ‘‘not to exceed, perhaps, a 
twentieth part.”’* No doubt these latter estimates were some- 
what extreme in their way, for the memorialists in each case were 
not without bias. However, we may perhaps steer a middle 
course. If we take the actual wool importations at 1% to 2 mil- 
lion pounds and a proportion of foreign to total wool consump- 


1 State Papers, Finance, v, 793, 795, 798, 799, 803, 804, 805, 807. 

2 Tbid., pp. 793, 797, 801, 802, 805. The same alignment of manufacturers is 
evident in the Report on Manufactures of 1832. The great majority of mills for 
which evidence on this point is available reported the use of native wool alone; but 
certain concerns indicated a considerable employment of foreign fiber. These con- 
cerns were of two types. One was the fine-goods production. The Fitchburg 
Woolen Manufacturing Company reported the use of one-third Spanish wool and 
two-thirds American (McLane’s Report, i, 486); the Middlesex Woolen Company, 
one-third from Vermont and the rest from abroad (ibid., p. 342); while for the North- 
ampton mill above mentioned, three-quarters of the wool consumed was said to be 
foreign (p. 308). The other group was composed of the producers of very cheap 
fabrics. Thus the Canton Woolen Manufactory, turning out a large proportion of 
negro cloth, indicated the use of 300,000 pounds of Smyrna wool and only 50,000 
pounds of domestic staple (p. 376). However, the general impression, which one 
secures from an inspection of McLane’s Report, does not differ from that stated in 
the text. 

3 “Memorial of the Citizens of Boston” (reprinted), p. 12; 20th Cong., rst Sess., 
Senate Document, No. 53. 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 249 


tion in the mills at some intermediate figure, —say, an eighth, — 
obviously the factories were employing a weight of raw material 
much greater than twenty years earlier. Assuming a rough figure 
of 15 million pounds for the total factory consumption, this was a 
tremendous increase over the 400,000 pounds of 1810. 

Just what relation may be assigned to the growth in the two 
periods, 1810-1816 and 1816-1830 respectively, is somewhat un- 
certain. Assuredly, the statement of North that “the actual prog- 
ress of the (wool-manufacturing) industry in this decade (1820- 
1830) was relatively less than in any other in our history”’ cannot 
be accepted. The development in this later period, of course, 
was not in some respects so spectacular as in the hot-house period 
of interrupted commerce, but after the reaction in 1815-1816 
there apparently came a steady and solid growth which put the 
industry of 1830 far ahead of the industry even at the previous 
high point, say, in 1815. Indeed, I am inclined to allocate fully a 
half of the increase in manufacturing capacity to the period after 
the conclusion of peace. This advance was not so much the result 
of an increase in the number of establishments as a growth in the | 
average size of such concerns. A substantial increase in the 
number of mills, to be sure, did take place in this period, especially 
with the western movement of settlement; but these mills were 
of greater average capacity than those established fifteen or 
twenty years before. Meanwhile in the eastern states the trend 
was distinctly toward establishments of larger size, —a trend 
caused by the widening of the domestic cloth market, the change 
in the character of goods produced, and the adoption of improved 
machinery. Mills of somewhat larger size, devoting their efforts 
to the production of goods which did not demand special care and 
skill, and utilizing a considerable complement of power-driven 
machinery, necessarily called for a much larger quantity of raw 
material than the upstart mills of 1815 or even 1820. 

Geographical Distribution. The growth of wool factories in the 
period prior to 1830 was not limited to any one section of the 
country. To be sure, the development in the southern states was 


1 North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 206. From any point of view other than that of pro- 
ductive capacity, the statement above quoted is even less true. 


250 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


not great; yet, in an enumeration of 1823, fifteen factories using 
wool alone or with other fibers were reported for Maryland, four 
for Virginia, and even two for Georgia. New England had al- 
ready jumped into the lead with ninety-seven establishments out 
of a total for the whole country of two hundred and twenty; but 
New York boasted the greatest number of any state (thirty-six 
mills),and Pennsylvania was not far behind this with thirty-three. 
While the absolute figures for the several states are perhaps much 
in error, the general picture is, I believe, correct.2, A somewhat 
similar view pertaining to the next decade, indeed to 1836, is 
presented in the following tabulation, — based, however, upon 
sets of machinery instead of separate mills: * 


DISTRIBUTION OF SETS OF WOOLEN MACHINERY, BY FABRICS AND BY 
STATES — 1836 


. =) 

wn a ee x a > & ee tee ea 

B22 % sa § 22 ee 

Broadcloths ... . 344 3... 37 190 4 X70 3000 gums gee eet 

Cassimeres ras 178 5 IO - 23° So.) .4 6 Ae I. es eae ee 

Satinets in. Svea eae 574. 5 19 37 105 10 .03°10O (20a 7 eee 

Plannels: sou sar tie FEO NW ekOS is A ee 90 40 =3)) [360 eee 

Linseys ek eaten ona ie 210 .. «1 «s 18 60 Eh Rr ey ere eee 
Blankets, hats, and 

yarn o, sei BA. 2) he oe On ee 
LOU pectin as 1488 24 43 I00 509 80 147 351 20 II7 I2 I5 30 40 


This enumeration, like that of 1823, indicates the growing dom- 
inance of New England; and now this section is credited with 
approximately 60 per cent of the total capacity. Probably in the 
number of establishments, New England did not possess that 
ratio, but her mills were on the average larger affairs. The tabu- 
lation also indicates a substantial localization in the production of 
the finer fabrics. Over three-quarters of the machinery devoted 
to the manufacture of broadcloths and cassimeres was to be found 
in the three states, Massachusetts, New York, and Vermont, the 


1 18th Cong., 1st Sess., Senate Document, No. 45. 

2 The New York Census of 1825 gives a total of 189 woolen factories, and 28 
more cotton and woolen factories, for that state, an enumeration which un- 
doubtedly gave too liberal an interpretation to the term ‘‘factory.” 

3 Benton and Barry, Statistical View, 1837, p. 124. 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 251 


ratio in the case of broadcloth running to nearly 85 per cent. In 
the case of satinets, less than 60 per cent, and in that of linseys, 
only a third of the total capacity was concentrated in those states. 
On the whole, the production of satinets was the most widely dis- 
seminated, linseys finding little place at all in the manufacture of 
New England except Rhode Island. Satinet was a product meet- 
ing the general public needs with particularly wide success. Flan- 
nel was also a fabric with a wide popular demand, but its factory 
production was in 1836 more largely concentrated in a few states, 
perhaps because of the relatively short period since importations 
had played a considerable part in supplying the domestic market. 

Another noteworthy feature in the geographical distribution in 
1830 was the production in western states. The development of 
woolen mills west of the Alleghanies had, as a matter of fact, fol- 
lowed pretty closely the establishment of factories in the East. 
As early as 1811, Lexington, Kentucky, contained three woolen 
factories, though it is uncertain what size of mill they were;! one 
man helped to build a woolen factory in western Virginia or in 
Ohio in each year of the war; ? and the steam mill at Steubenville, 
Ohio, and that of Mr. Arthurs at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, stood 
out as conspicuous establishments even for the whole American 
industry. The success of the Steubenville concern seems to have 
been considerable. It was frequently spoken of as a “celebrated 
establishment;”’ and its standing was the occasion of thefollowing | 
comment by Niles in 1822: ‘‘The reflecting man will ponder not a 
little on the fact that wool is transported from New Jersey to 
be manufactured into cloth at Steubenville . . . and that such 
cloth is sent to the New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore mar- 
kets.” ? The enumeration of 1823, above mentioned, credited 

1 Niles, vi, 240. 2 Howells, Life in Ohio, 1813-1840, pp. 8-19. 

3 Niles, xxi, 367; xxviii, 82, note. The Steubenville mill was also noteworthy as 
being one of the earliest steam-driven plants. 

Another interesting case of competition flowing back from the frontier concerns 
the Piscataquis Manufacturing Company of Dover, Maine, —at that time a frontier 
settlement. By 1837 this Company was making cassimeres which were trucked 
thirty-five miles through the woods to tidewater at Bangor, the teaming being done 
by oxen. Thence the goods were sent to Philadelphia by sailing vessel, where they 


were consigned to a commission house and sold on account (Sketch of the Mills of 
the American Woolen Co., 1901, p. 108). 


252 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Ohio with thirteen, Kentucky with eleven, and even Indiana with 
two wool-working establishments. By 1836, the number of mills 
in this region was probably much increased, Ohio being shown 
with thirty sets in the tabulation just presented, and Kentucky 
and Tennessee together with forty. Incidentally, a feature 
worthy of note in connection with the sets operating in these 
states is that almost all were being employed in the manufacture 
of linseys and satinets, products particularly well adapted to 
western use. 

Probably, however, these western mills were less mature affairs 
than most of the eastern establishments, at least on the marketing 
side. Except for one or two concerns like that at Steubenville, 
they sold almost wholly to the countryside close by their plants, 
and frequently not for cash. A typical case is that of a “‘factory”’ 
in Clarkville, western Pennsylvania. Around 1830 “‘a great part 
of the wool”’ was being ‘‘ worked on shares; some little purchased ;” 
only asmall amount of cash was actually paid out in wages, the 
‘“‘work being done by persons composing the company;”’ and while 
some sales were for cash or credit, part of the product was sold for 
wool and part for ‘‘produce.’’! The ‘“‘New Steam Wool Carding 
Factory” of Lexington, Kentucky, presents a somewhat similar 
picture. The proprietors advertise in 1829 that they will card, 
spin, or weave on commission for household workers; that they 
‘“‘keep constantly on hand and for sale at the Factory” linseys, 
negro cloths, and like fabrics; and that they will “‘receive in pay- 
ment for Carding, Spinning, Colouring, Weaving, or for any of 
the above articles, Wool, Wood, Pork, Lard, Feathers, Bacon — 
in short, they will receive all most any article the farmers may 
have to dispose of.’?? Obviously, then, such mills were substan- 
tially behind eastern mills in development, perhaps ten years 
behind. But it is of significance that westward expansion had 
already made considerable advance. Already one can see the 
beginning of that relatively wide distribution of woolen fac- 
tories which was to characterize the industry for many decades 
to come. 


1 McLane’s Report, ii, 423. 
* Documentary History of American Industrial Society, ii, 335. 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 253 


2. The Character of the Representative Establishment. 


Much has already been brought out from time to time concern- 
ing the character of the factory in 1830, — its technical equipment, 
its practical self-sufficiency, the nature of its products, and the 
like. However, an assembling of these various points in a sum- 
mary fashion seems desirable in an effort to picture more ade- 
quately the typical mill of that period. 

The growth of the wool manufacture in the early decades of the 
century, as has already been noted, was not merely an expansion 
of total capacity: there was also an appreciable growth in the size 
of the representative manufacturing unit. The first general type 
of establishment to develop, the quasi-handicraft shop, was a 
diminutive affair, — perhaps a shed and two or three workers. 
But the early mills were often not much larger. The first mill in 
Uxbridge, Massachusetts, beginning as a fulling-carding shop, 
had at the outset a building of two stories (of which one was 
perhaps the basement) measuring twenty feet by forty. To con- 
vert this into a complete manufactory of cloth, an addition, 
twenty-five feet by thirty and possibly three stories high, was 
built. The equipment was, of course, small,—just the carding 
machines, billy, and jenny that went to make up a single “‘set,”’ — 
the weaving apparently being done outside. Nor had the Cecil 
Manufacturing Company at Elkton, Maryland, a much larger es- 
tablishment. While we have no information as to its equipment, 
the building, it appears, was only sixty feet long by thirty-six 
feet wide, and possibly three stories high.2 With the Middlesex 
Woolen Manufacturing Company, however, one reaches a concern 
of somewhat greater size, although here the volume of production 
was distinctly low. The principal building was forty feet by 
thirty-six, and five stories high; to which was added a rear building 
forty by twenty (one story high?),a dyehouse, and other outbuild- 
ings. The machinery for washing, carding, reeling, fulling, and 
finishing, as well as for warming the building in winter, was driven 
by a steam engine, — a rather unique feature, — but a steam en- 


1 Taft, pp. 46-47. 
2 Bagnall, p. 235. This mill was built in 1794 or 1795. 


254 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


gine of only twenty-five horse power. Sixty to eighty hands were 
employed at the mill, the weaving here, it seems, being done on 
the place. But with all this equipment only forty yards of broad- 
cloth were manufactured in a day.!_ Colonel Humphreys’s factory 
in Connecticut was somewhat larger yet, and, indeed, was one of 
the most extensive of the times. In 1811 it contained a picker, 
four carding machines, two jennies, a billy of forty spindles, four 
broad and eight narrow looms, two newly invented shearing ma- 
chines, and four fulling mills, besides eighteen stocking frames. A 
building one hundred feet long and thirty-six feet wide, of four 
stories, housed this equipment, and for the operation of this 
apparatus contained a working force numbering as many as 
one-hundred and fifty persons.?, But the usual mill at that time 
was of the one-set character, — for example, John Scholfield’s 
establishment at Stonington, Connecticut, and Daniel Stearns’s 
at Pittsfield, Massachusetts.*? The period around 1810 was the 
era of the small factory, a factory often dependent upon house- 
hold workers for the weaving of its own fabrics and not infre- 
quently dependent upon patronage from the household system for 
much of its activity. Several of the operations in such a mill, es- 
pecially spinning and weaving, were still hand processes, and the 
volume of daily production very low. Correspondingly, the mar- 
ket which it supplied was quite restricted. Much of the output 


1 Field, Account of Middlesex County, Connecticut, 1819, p. 41; Bishop, ii, 180. 
This concern began operations in 1810. 

2 Dwight, Travels, iii, 392; North, in Davis’s New England States, i, 205. Other 
typical mills might be instanced, The equipment of the Housatonick Manufactur- 
ing Company at Pittsfield, Massachusetts, was: three double-carding machines, a 
picker, three spinning jennies of 140 spindles in all, a roping jack, four broad and 
three narrow looms, besides finishing machinery (Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 
469). That of John Scholfield, Jr.’s mill at Jewett City, Connecticut: one carding 
machine called a ‘‘double-breaker,” two finishing carding machines, one roping 
machine of 40 spindles, two spinning jennies of 40 spindles each, one spinning jack 
of 60 spindles, four broad and seven narrow looms, and one twisting frame of 70 
spindles (Bagnall, p. 459). The Providence Woolen Manufacturing Company, 
it is said, was “intended to manufacture daily 200 yards of Broadcloth” 
(Dwight, Travels, iv, 494). Even the mixed cotton and wool manufactory of 
Lexington, Kentucky, was “‘a stone building, of 120 feet by 40 and five stories 
high with power both of steam and water” (Kayser, Commercial Directory, 1823, 
Pp. 55). 

3 Bagnall, p. 424; Smith, History of Berkshire County, ii, 342. 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 255 


was disposed of at the mill itself, though occasionally some portion 
was sent to nearby towns. 

From 1810 to 1830 the change in the character of the factory 
was not altogether a steady process. The advance prior to 1820 
was, I fancy, not great; and the movement became considerable 
only after that date. Nor did the change produce a complete 
transformation in the domestic industry. Small mills were still 
the common run in many sections of the country, especially in the 
less well-developed regions. In looking over McLane’s Report on 
Manufactures, for example, one is impressed by the large number 
of small mills scattered through Maine and Vermont, western 
New York State, and such newer areas as Ohio and Kentucky. 
Representative of these establishments is the Bristol (Maine) 
Satinet Factory. Housed in a wooden structure twenty-six feet 
by fifty, and two stories high, were four sets of cards, one hundred 
and fifty-five spindles, and four looms; while the labor force of the 
“factory” consisted of only nine persons.’ Again, the Report, 
after presenting data from some fifty concerns in New York State 
which it describes as “‘almost all the large woolen establishments 
in the State,” notes that, according to a contemporaneous Reg- 
ister, the total number of wool-working enterprises within the 
state reached two hundred and two. The greater part of the 
other one hundred and fifty are described as ‘“‘small establish- 
ments, engaged in manufacturing to a limited extent only, and 
depending very much on what is called ‘custom work,’ 1. e., card- 
ing, dressing cloth manufactured in families, and taking wool 
to manufacture at ‘halves,’ the manufacturers and the persons 
furnishing the raw material sharing equally the manufactured 
article.” * Indeed, the country was still dotted with small ‘‘man- 

1 McLane’s Report, i, 6. 

2 Ibid., ii, go. 

The term ‘“‘factory”’ was loosely used in this period before 1830. For example, 
in 1826 it was reported that Vermont had 287 “‘small factories,” although they 
possessed only 242 carding machines altogether, and although only “about one- 
third are now in order to work in the several branches of picking, carding, roping, 
spinning, weaving, fulling, dyeing, and dressing,” i. e., in the complete wool manu- 
facture. To put these other two-thirds into ‘‘a complete state for manufacturing 


in all its branches,”’ however, all that needed to be added to the equipment of each 
was ‘‘a billy or roping machine of 20 spindles, a jenny of 50 spindles, and 3 looms”! 


256 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


ufactories” which perhaps should better be designated shops 
than factories. Not until a much later date was manufac- 
turing concentrated into particularly efficient, large mills which 
by force of their comparative strength and with the aid of 
improved transportation conditions could drive the small, local 
enterprises from the field. 

Because of the persistence in 1830 of many small concerns, 
averages of capacity or labor force by states or sections are of 
little value. Thus, one can point out that according to McLane’s 
Report on Manufactures the twenty-two Rhode Island mills 
possessed a total of only thirty-nine sets of woolen machinery.1 
Again, he can show that the average number of employees in the 
factories of Connecticut in 1832 was twenty-eight, in those of 
Massachusetts thirty-seven, and in those of Rhode Island only 
seventeen.” These averages of employees, to be sure, do indi- 
cate substantial growth when compared with the similar figures 
recorded by the Census of r8ro for the factories of that time. 
But such statistics are not, to my mind, the most significant. 

The trend of the industry rather than the average of the period 
is the feature that seems the most suggestive, and this trend is 
indicated by the evolution during the twenties of factories with 
a considerable manufacturing capacity. The number of such es- 
tablishments, too, was sufficiently great to eliminate the possi- 
bility that the development was a chance affair. A few examples 
will make evident the new situation. Samuel Slater & Sons’ mill 
at Webster, Massachusetts, was producing broadcloth, cassimere, 
and satinet to the quantity of 80,000 yards annually, and em- 
ploying 128 persons; the Hamilton Woolen Company manufac- 
tured 50,000 yards of broadcloth and had a working force of 104 
persons; while a woolen factory at Dedham, Massachusetts, 
turned out 150,000 yards of cloth and employed 100 men, 12 boys, 
(Memorial of Vermont Manufacturers and Growers of Wool, pp. 9-10, to be found 
in the Boston Public Library). In McLane’s Report, too, many carding or fulling 
mills are entered as “‘factories,”’ especially as to the western states. — 

1 McLane’s Report, i, 976. 


2 [bid., i, 112-577, 982, 976. The fifty-four largest New York mills averaged 
twenty-seven employees (zbid., ii, 91). 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 257 


and 150 women.’ The Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company at 
Pittsfield was started in 1825 with a brick building, 145 feet by 
50, and 4 stories high; and its initial equipment included 6 card- 
ing machines, 5 jennies, a Brewster frame, and 20 power looms.” 
At Somersworth, New Hampshire, were 2 large plants: the 
Great Falls Manufacturing Company, partly cotton, but also 
turning out 130,000 yards of broadcloth yearly; and the Salmon 
Falls Manufacturing Company, with its 220 employees, producing 
Over 40,000 yards more of the same article.* The flannel facto- 
ries near Amesbury and the negro-cloth mill at Canton, Massa- 
chusetts, are likewise noteworthy.* New York State, too, boasted 
a significant development. The thirty largest mills averaged 
nearly three sets apiece, and such well-known establishments as 
the Oriskany Manufactory and the Glenham Company reported 
working forces of 147 and 130 respectively.° But most conspicu- 
ous and promising of all was the essay of the Middlesex Company 
at Lowell, commenced in 1830. It started with the ample capital 
of $100,000; and in 1832 was reported to be producing 135,000 
yards of cassimere and 30,000 yards of cassinets, and to be em- 
ploying a working force of 185 persons. Equipped with the most 
improved machinery, and organized somewhat after the pattern 
of the cotton mills in its neighborhood, it stands out as a con- 
spicuous example of the development which had for some time 
been going on.® 


1 McLane’s Report, i, 576-577, 536-537, 378-379. 

The Hamilton Company is said to have possessed five sets of machinery in 1831, 
and twenty-eight broad looms (Ammidown’s Historical Collections, ii, 374). 

2 Smith, History of Pittsfield, ii, 485; Records of the Company. 

3 Niles, xxxi, 205; xxxlii, 157; McLane’s Report, i, 581-582; Clark, p. 566. 

4 Niles, xxxii, 178; McLane’s Report, i, 210-211, 252-253; Canton: Niles, xxxi, 
206; Harrisburg Convention, Proceedings, p. 66; McLane’s Report, i, 376-377. 

5 McLane’s Report, ii, 60-62, 75-70, OI. 

6 Tbid., i, 342-343; Clark, p. 566; North, Bulletin, 1902, p. 311. In addi- 
tion to concerns mentioned in the text, additional references may be 
given: Wheelock, in Chapin, p. 143 (Uxbridge Woolen Mill); Martin, Seventy- 
three Years’ History of the Boston Stock Market, p. 20; Niles, xxxvil, 150; 
XXVili, 309; xxxii, 226, 306; North, in Davis’s New England States, i, 208; 
State Papers, Finance, v, 599; Bishop, ii, 378; McLane’s Reports, i, 134-135, 166- 
167, 212-213, 278-279, 308-309, 328-329, 356-357, 484-485, 502-503, 506-509, 
526-527. 


258 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


Such mills, in fact, marked the dawn of a new era. The pre- 
ceding years had brought the adoption of power machinery by 
the larger and more progressive concerns, the introduction of new 
fabrics better adapted to general American consumption, and the 
broadening of the market for these goods. To be sure, most of 
the mills still relied wholly or chiefly upon water for motive force, 
and in consequence were scattered pretty widely through the 
country; but the occasional introduction of steam power indi- 
cated the beginning of the modern period. Despite the persis- 
tence of many small and immature establishments, undoubt- 
edly the factory had now made a place for itself, — indeed, 
had become the characteristic feature of the American wool 
manufacture. 


3. Place of Factory Production in Supply of the Domestic Market. 


The narration of the increase in factory production of woolen 
fabrics, of the geographical spread of the industry, and of the 
expansion in size of the representative manufacturing concern 
may give an exaggerated idea of the part played by factory oper- 
ations in the years around 1830. Lest this should be the case, 
it may be well to compare the volume of factory production with 
the total domestic consumption of wool fabrics. Domestic fac- 
tory output, domestic household manufacture, and foreign im- 
portations must be considered together, and an attempt made to 
assess the share in consumption contributed by each. Already 
the relation between the first two factors has been pointed out: 
that household production in the United States probably ex- 
ceeded in volume the output from factories in something like 
the ratio of four to three.’ But to correlate domestic household 
and factory production with foreign imports is a difficult prob- 
lem, since homogeneous and trustworthy statistics of quantity 
or value covering these three fields do not exist. 

A glance at the contemporary estimates in the matter of value 
will give some idea of the obstacles encountered in arriving at 
a sound conclusion. The annual production of Massachusetts 
factories alone was placed in the early thirties at 6% million 


1 See above, p. 190. 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 259 


dollars.' For the whole country the yearly output of factories 
was in 1830 placed at 14% millions bya Congressional committee, 
— a figure, incidentally, which North accepts in his sketch of the 
industry’s history.2, But data presented by the Friends of Do- 
mestic Industry in 1831 lead to a much higher estimate. The 
Friends put household and factory production together at 4o 
million dollars annually; and from this figure we can deduce the 
factory production alone as from 24 to 30 millions, — this by 
inference from the Friends’ guess as to volume of output in the 
two sections of the industry.* Finally, one may quote the figures 
of Mr. Mallary, chairman of the House Committee on Manufac- 
tures. In 1828 he gave 22 millions as the value of factory-made 
goods, and 40 millions as that of household production, or a total 
of 62 millions.* With which of these estimates shall one compare 
the data upon importations, — an average of slightly over 7 
million dollars (duty-paid) for the years 1829-1831?5 And how 
shall one place a sure valuation upon household production? 
There exists in fact no adequate basis for discriminating among 
the several estimates of value put upon factory production, nor 
any means of arriving at a sound valuation of household output. 
Therefore, a comparison upon the basis of value of factory, house- 
hold, and foreign contributions to the domestic market obviously 
is impracticable. 

A somewhat better basis is that of wool consumption, i. e., a 
comparison of the wool consumed in domestic household and 
factory production with the amount embodied in the fabrics im- 


1 Census of 1860, iii, p. xxxil. 

2 North, Bulletin, 1901, pp. 206-207. 

3 Report of Convention of the Friends of Domestic Industry, p. 79. 

The Report gives the ratio in terms of volume between factory and homemade 
fabrics as three to two; but in terms of value the ratio would presumably give 
greater weight to the factory output. 

4 Congressional Debates, March 4, 1828, p. 1733. 

5 This figure excludes importations of carpets, knit-goods, and stuff-goods. The 
first two are excluded with obvious propriety. Stuff-goods were also noncompeti- 
tive, except in a minor, indirect way, with American woolen fabrics. No domestic 
manufacture of such goods existed, — at least, no significant manufacture. Even 
protectionists of the period paid little or no attention to this particular form of 
importation. 


260 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


ported. Even here one must adopt indirect and rather approxi- 
mate methods. We may begin with the total amount of wool 
available. This would include the domestic clip, 30 to 32 million 
pounds around 1830, according to Wright’s careful study, and 
the quantity of imported wool, between 1% and 2 million 
pounds. At a maximum, then, 34 million pounds of wool 
were available for domestic cloth production; and this would, 
according to our previous surmise, be divided between house- 
hold and factory use in the ratio of something like 4 to 3: say, 
1g or 20 millions for the household and 14% or 15 millions 
for the mills.2, Now, what of importations? Here we have 
another estimate, that of Mr. Mallary, made in the course of 
Congressional debate during 1828. According to his calculation, 
an importation of cloths, flannels, and blankets valued at $6,100,- 
ooo represented raw wool to the amount of 9,000,000 pounds.? 
Applying this estimate as well as one can to the actual importa- 
tions in the period 1829-1831, valued at $7,022,000 duty-paid, 
one arrives at a figure for raw-wool content of 10,900,000 
pounds.* This result, however, ought, I believe, to be sub- 
jected to a liberal discount. Mallary was interested in showing 
the relation between the volume of wool imported in the form 
of goods and the domestic wool clip; and accordingly would be 
tempted to exaggerate the raw-wool content of given fabrics. 


1 This matter was brought out above, p. 247. 

2 This checks fairly closely with the estimate of 15 millions of factory wool 
consumption arrived at above (p. 249) by a somewhat different method. 

8 Congressional Debates, March 4, 1828, p. 1739. Mr. Mallary was computing 
the amount of wool which would be required if all imports of raw wool and of wool 
manufactures were prohibited. For wool manufactures, his method of estimation 
was as follows: 


Value Raw Wool Equivalent 








Cloths and cassimeres imported ......... $5,000,000 6,500,000 ibs. 

Flannels-and ‘baizes\tise see.cr we ee cee oe 500,000 1,000,000 “ 

Blankets’ 2 )F (cenertaling eich car ec iced ire omnes 600,000 1,500,000 ‘‘ 
Total ci Lae ee te siar eo eee, ee ete $6,100,000 9,000,000 “f 


4 For the period 1829-1831 the total values (duty- pad) of the three groups of 
imports mentioned by Mallary were as follows: 
Cloths and cassimeres .<..66/. i = 20 oss, be) an Was Oe $5,895,000 


Flannels’ >) oso ei) ass sesactlens pu ea ie deine oC ee 123,000 
Blankets.) o.oo ay a a eats ea tbe ee al cliera) es a 1,003,000 


THE FACTORY IN 1830 261 


Moreover, I have attempted, with the assistance of the trade, 
to check Mallary’s estimates by calculating the wool con- 
tent of the British exports of wool goods, for which statis- 
tics of yardage are available. I should be inclined to place 
the figure for importations on a good round basis of 7,500,000 
pounds. 

Finally, taking this estimate into comparison with domestic 
consumption, we reach the following summary: wool used in 
American household manufacture, 19 to 20 million pounds; that 
employed in American factories, 141% to 15 million pounds; and 
that represented in importations, 714 million pounds, — or, 
roughly, ratios of four, three, and one and a half respectively. 
And these ratios, it may be added, tally closely, at least as far 
as the part played by importations is concerned, with certain con- 
temporary opinions on the subject: the statement of Mr. Tufts, 
a prominent mill-owner of the times who, before the Committee 
on Manufactures in 1828, remarked that something like four- 
fifths of the total domestic consumption of woolen goods was of 
domestic manufacture; and the comparison, made by Mr. Mal- 
lary in 1828 upon the basis of value, between domestic factory- 
made goods and importations,— namely, that the former 
amounted to a value of 22 million dollars, and the latter to one 
of only 10 million dollars.” 

Factory production, in short, supplied little more than a third 
of the domestic demand for wool cloths at the close of our present 
period. Undoubtedly it had made great progress since even so 
recent a date as 1810, when it added merely 200,000 yards to 
the total domestic supply. Nevertheless, much ground was yet 
to be gained from the household industry; and if importations 
bulked anywhere near as large as I have assumed, serious effort 
still remained to be made in ousting foreign goods. While hold- 


1 Particularly I had the help of Mr. Nathaniel Stevens of M. T. Stevens & Sons 
Company; and arrived at the figure of 6,500,000 pounds. Even with a 25 per cent 
added to cover possible underestimates and importations from other countries, the 
total would be only 8,100,000 pounds. 

2 State Papers, Finance, v, 813; Congressional Debates, March 4, 1828, p. 1733. 
I have given considerable weight to Mallary’s proportion between domestic mill- 
made goods and those imported, since it seems unlikely that he would underesti- 
mate the part played by the latter. 


262 THE ERA OF THE SMALL FACTORY 


ing forth promises of a splendid future, the domestic factory of 


1830 could not be said to have dominated the local markets of 
that period. 


1 [Incidentally one may note that the relationship between importations and 
domestic factory production may well account for the intensity with which Ameri- 
can manufacturers demanded protective duties. —They were competing with a foe 
who could still push large weights of goods over the existing tariff wall, at least 
weights which bulked large in comparison with the quantities of goods that they 
themselves could turn out. 


PART III 
THE MATURE FACTORY 





INTRODUCTION 


SUBSEQUENT to the appearance of the factory as a distinct indus- 
trial form in the wool manufacture, another satisfactory stopping 
place is difficult to find, i. e., another period or point of time at 
which one may pause to discover the status of the industry. 
Superficially at least, the course of development seems to have 
been without any important changes in direction, and, to be sure, 
one must admit that continuity of movement has always played 
the more dominant réle. Yet forty years, or about forty years, 
after the era which we have just been considering, came a turn- 
ing point of considerable significance. Conditions which had 
surrounded the industry during the intervening decades were then 
beginning to change rapidly, and within the manufacture itself 
important new features were just appearing. Accordingly, by 
breaking into the evolution of the industry at this point it 
is possible not merely to summarize the preceding experience 
but also to understand the nature and sources of subsequent 
development. 

The criteria which have determined the interruption at or 
around 1870 differ from those which made 1830 a natural stop- 
ping point. For the latter the elements of industrial form and 
technical equipment were paramount. But there is no essential 
change in industrial form after 1830 until the combination move- 
ment of relatively recent years; and while there are factors on 
the technological side which make 1870 a not unreasonable point 
for pause and review, they would not be conclusive of themselves. 
Rather, the elements of most significance are: quality in pro- 
duction, predominance of the factory over competitive methods, 
geographical distribution, and the commercial policy of the coun- 
try. In quality of output the years around 1870 cover an im- 
portant transition. The developments of the preceding years 
are reflected in the output of the mills, and yet the changes of 
the succeeding decades are quite distinctly foreshadowed. The 

265 


266 THE MATURE FACTORY 


years around 1870 also mark the close of that long movement 
through which, at least for the greater part of the country, the 
household production of wool fabrics was blotted out; while they 
also disclose a pronounced dispersion of factories throughout the 
country, — a feature of the industry not unrelated to the extir- 
pation of the household manufacture. Finally, the Civil War, 
working many changes in the industry, had bequeathed not 
only a situation of temporarily extended manufacturing capacity 
but also a policy of tariff protection which gave a new basis in 
this regard for subsequent industrial development. To these 
features, then, special attention will be given. 


CHAPTER XIII 
GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 


1. A MARKED expansion in production is one of the most impor- 
tant phenomena in the history of the wool-manufacturing industry 
during the period between 1830 and 1870. The strength of the 
young manufacture, as indicated in previous chapters, forecast a 
considerable growth; but in some ways the subsequent develop- 
ment was more appreciable than could have been anticipated. 
There had been a marked increase in population, —from 13 
millions in 1830 to 39 millions in 1870, —a steady westward ex- 
tension of settlement, a rapid growth in transportation facilities, 
and an appreciable tendency toward urban concentration. These 
together with factors more closely connected with the manufac- 
ture itself, e. g., the decline of household fabrication and the 
initiation of the worsted-cloth production, gave a peculiarly great 
stimulus to factory output in the whole wool-manufacturing in- 
dustry. The general net effect of these various forces is portrayed 
in the following statistics, covering as fully as possible the forty 
years now under consideration, of the number of mills, the ma- 
chine equipment in terms of sets, the number of employees, and 
the consumption of raw material, — although, it may be noted, 
some of the individual figures presented on the following page 
are doubtless quite inaccurate. 

Obviously the expansion of the industry in the forty years be- 
tween 1830 and 1870 was extraordinary. The woolen branch 
alone, measured in terms of sets, increased six-fold. Other sig- 
nificant criteria which permit the woolen and worsted sections to 
be grouped together indicate even larger growth. The number of 
employees in 1870 was nearly five times that thirty years before, 
1840; and presumably there had been a marked advance in the 
decade preceding the latter date. But perhaps the best index is 
that of the consumption of raw materials, picturing as it does the 
volume of goods turned out. The quantity of wool used in the 
factories around 1830 has been estimated as something like 14% 

207 


268 THE MATURE FACTORY 


or 15 million pounds.! Ascompared with this, the consumption of 
raw wool alone had advanced to 71 million pounds in 1849 and to 
189 million pounds in 1869, — an increase of above twelve-fold 
by the latter date. But in the meanwhile the utilization of cotton 
and cotton yarn had undoubtedly increased somewhat more rap- 
idly, particularly with the expansion of the worsted manufacture; 
while the intermixture of shoddy in wool fabrics, not begun until 
after 1830, was in 1869 contributing another 19 million pounds of 
material. Accordingly, measured in terms of all the material em- 
ployed in the industry, expansion had been substantially more 
than twelve-fold, though perhaps not quite so much as fifteen- 
fold. Such a growth of the industry cannot be regarded other- 
wise than as remarkable. 


WOOLEN MILLs? 
1837 1840 1845 1849 1859 1869 


Number of Establishments .. .... 1420... ‘102% * (asKG 1260 =. 28g I 
Number of Sets. Goatees 485) fa: 1940.5 tye ee 3209 «©=_: 8366 
Number of Employees .. . woes 21,342 “.. 18 9 3G;26@p i s0o meee 
Raw Material Consumed: pail: 

lions of pounds *2 2g aa STO) i etee ee 71 99 212 


WorstTED MILLS 


Number of Establishments 4... 0 0)..40)0 4). 6 2 3 102 
Number of Employees .. . Sooty Pica nl pO RRB 2378 12,920 
Raw Material Consumed: rae 

lions Of MOUNGS c)a.\e cents ne PrP UR ats 5 22 


1 See above, p. 260. 

2 The sources of data for this tabulation are the Censuses of 1840 to 1870; Benton 
and Barry, Statistical View (p. 124), for the 1837 figures; while those for 1845 are de- 
rived from a booklet entitled ‘‘Statistics of the Woolen Manufactories in the 
United States,” which is usually attributed to William H. Graham (hereafter re- 
ferred to as Graham). 

3’ A somewhat similar figure, one of 1067, is given by Fleischmann, Erwerbszweige, 
Fabrikwesen, und Handel der Vereinigten Staaten von Nord-Amerika, 1845, pp. 40-43. 

4 The data through 1849 are for wool alone. Thereafter, as the figures hecome 
available, cotton and other raw materials are added. 

5 This is, I believe, an overestimate. The estimate previously made in this 
study (p. 260, above) for the consumption in 1830 was 14 to 15 million pounds. 
One reason for thinking this figure of Benton and Barry too high is that they 
assign only 12 million pounds of wool for consumption in the households of the 
country while estimating the factory consumption at 31 million pounds. Probably 
20 to 22 million pounds for the factory consumption, even at the peak of produc- 
tion before the crisis of 1837, would be a liberal estimate. 


GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 269 


2. However, this expansion did not take place in a wholly 
regular and methodicalmanner. Despite some contradictory data, 
it is quite clear that the industry experienced two chief periods of 
growth. One was between 1830 and 1850, which may be con- 
sidered a continuation of the expansion prior to that time. The 
second was the decade of the sixties, tied up of course with the 
conditions imposed by the Civil War. During the decade of the 
fifties, there was small total expansion: wool consumption, even 
including the new worsted industry, increased only from 70 to 86 
millions of pounds; the number of employees rose but about four 
thousand; and the number of establishments actually declined. 
To be sure, there was by no means complete stagnation within the 
industry. The character of production, the geographical dis- 
tribution of the manufacture, and the technique of the industry all 
underwent important modification. The diminution in the num- 
ber of establishments might even turn out to be connected with 
certain advantages. Yet on the whole one must conclude that 
this was a period of relative backwardness. And this fact be- 
comes especially clear if we consider the general situation in the 
country. The population of the country was increasing from 23 
to 31 millions, the kindred cotton manufacture was expanding 
materially, and indeed the nation as a whole was enjoying a pros- 
perousera. The forces which produced such a pause in the spread 
of the domestic wool manufacture, as well as those which induced 
the growth of the other periods, will appear in the later discussion. 
Chiefly they concern the technical advance, the tariff, and the 
wool supply, besides the more obvious influence in the last decade 
of conditions imposed by the war. 

The development of the industry, again, concerns more than 
the increase in total manufacturing capacity. Of scarcely less 
interest is the geographical location of the industry. At first con- 
fining attention to the woolen branch, it is evident that in this 
regard the decade of the seventies forms a real dividing line. While 
transportation facilities remained inadequate, mills at a distance 
from the coast or from the larger centers of wool manufacture 
could profitably take advantage of the cheap water power, local 
supplies of wool, and the local markets; provided of course that 


270 THE MATURE FACTORY 


they confined their production to those fabrics which the local 
wool permitted them to turn out and which the local markets were 
willing to purchase. The status of transportation facilities was 
the most important factor in the earlier decades. For example, 
British cloths were reported in 1842 to cost in our port cities 
double their original figures, but, says this account, “‘as they 
proceed west they become three times the price they cost to the 
English consumer.”’! In similar manner the price of domestic 
goods, if shipped westward, would be much enhanced. It was not 
strange, then, that factories were established in the western states 
as population moved forward. Factories in Ohio and western 
Pennsylvania were noted in the earlier period. The first one in 
Illinois is dated 1842; by 1847 a mill was in operation at Mil- 
waukee; and by 1856 mills had been set up as far west as Cedar 
Rapids and Washington, Iowa.” In the year 1856, operations in 
the far western states commenced also. The Willamette Woolen 
Manufacturing Company was founded at Salem, Oregon, and 
only three years later, the Pioneer Woolen Mills of San Francisco, 
California, were established.’ 

The gross effect of this westward movement is reflected in such 
figures as we have of the proportion of establishments and sets in 
the several sections of the country: 


PERCENTAGE OF ESTABLISHMENTS PERCENTAGE OF SETS 

New Middle All New Middle All 
England States Others England States Others 
Tass ee aes eve 60.6 34.6 4.8 
5845 255.40 ee aS Pe Sy Tiny 56.7 34.9 8.4 
1BAQ Fey ste ee 30D 45.9 ae lets et 5 eae 
1880 pe, ba tL 37.8 30.6 51.8 28.7 19.5 
T8004, co nae eee enc 26.9 52.1 40.1 27.9 32.0 
1870 Vas Geen. 26.6 48.8 49.0 26.8 24.2 


1 27th Cong., 2nd Sess., Senate Documents, No. 357, p. 6. 

2 Western Monthly, i, 247; Riley, Development of Chicago and Vicinity as a Manu- 
facturing Center, p. 55; Parker, Iowa Handbook, 1856, pp. 76, 92. 

3 Bulletin, 18609, p. 62; Hunt’s Merchants’ Magazine, xxxix, 127. 

4 Benton and Barry. This enumeration is avowedly an estimate with respect to 
several states, including Kentucky and Tennessee, and probably if anything un- 
derstates the proportions in the western communities. 

5 Graham. The same qualifications apply here as with regard to Benton and 
Barry. 


GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 271 


While at all times the New England states held a more impor- 
tant place than any other section with respect to the more signifi- 
cant feature, that of machinery, the decline in their position, 
apparently steady from the thirties on to 1869, is very suggestive 
of the changing conditions... The western industry was grow- 
ing more rapidly than that of New England or that of the 
middle Atlantic states, both in number of establishments and in 
amount of equipment,— no considerable change in fact occur- 
ring with regard to the industry of the South. And the geo- 
graphical dissemination of the manufacture was proceeding at a 
really extraordinary rate. 

This westward expansion of the industry even up to the close of 
our present period was the more remarkable when it is realized 
that in the latter decades railroad and commercial facilities were 
increasing with considerable rapidity. The trunk-line railroads 
were in process of building or consolidation; the transcontinental 
roads were launched; and the network of the mid-western states 
was being filled in.2 Then, purely commercial factors had in- 
creased the competitive strength of eastern mills, especially the 
rise of a more stable distributive system for wool fabrics, while 
the possession of larger amounts of capital by the eastern manu- 
facturers and merchants would aid them materially in the ex- 
tension of their trade. Indeed, it was sometimes charged that the 


1 The utilization of “sets” as the basis of comparison, the only basis possible 
with the earlier years, probably puts the eastern sections in a worse light than if 
some other measure of manufacturing capacity could be employed. While the 
proportion of sets in the New England states for 1869 was only 40.1 per cent, that 
of spindles and of looms was 56.1 and 48.4, respectively. The “‘set” had by 1869 
ceased to be a homogeneous unit. With the broadening of the woolen card by the 
more progressive eastern establishments, the ‘‘set’’ was a somewhat different thing 
there than it was in the smaller, less progressive western mills. However, it is 
doubtful if the picture is much in error on this account. The earlier enumerations, 
those of 1837 and 1845, probably overvalued the eastern industry, and the decline 
in ratio of sets in the East between 1859 and 1869 was too great to be compensated 
by the increase in unit capacity of machines in eastern mills. With the utmost 
concession, it seems true that the eastern manufacture was making no relative 
headway in the fifties and sixties, and probably was falling somewhat behind the 
growth in the rest of the country. 

2 See MacGill, History of Transportation in the United States before 1860, ch. 16, 
and maps. 


272 THE MATURE FACTORY 


larger concerns in the East were deliberately “crowding their 
stuffs into the West in exchange for wool, aided by cash capital 
not possessed by small operators in the West.” ! But some of the 
factors which were of force in the earlier decades, — cheap water- 
supply, local wool supplies, and local markets, — were still of con- 
siderable significance. In addition, the extraordinary demand 
and high profits of the Civil War period brought new concerns in 
the West as well as increased production in the older eastern 
centers. Then, too, in some degree the westward movement and 
wider geographical distribution of the woolen industry is attribut- 
able to the peculiar nature of this manufacture. The woolen 
branch of the wool manufacture in foreign countries as well as the 
United States has at no time displayed the tendency toward the 
geographical concentration of industry and large-scale production 
which has marked the development in other industrial lines, such 
as the cotton manufacture, the steel industry, and even the sister 
branch of worsted production. Because of the close attention 
which the directing head of the establishment must pay to the 
manufacturing processes, because of importance attaching to the 
style factor, and for other less significant reasons, the woolen 
branch is today distributed more widely and is prosecuted on a 
smaller average scale than the worsted manufacture and many 
other branches of the textile industry.’ 

Yet there were certain developments in the decades between 1830 
and 1870 which foreshadowed some degree of concentration in 
the eastern states in subsequent years. First, the growth of cities 
in the East and the early rise of the wholesale clothing trade there 
were of influence. With the launching and expansion of the cloth- 
ing manufacture in Chicago and Cleveland some years after, to- 


1 62nd Cong., 1st Sess., Senate Documents, No. 72, p. 1989; quoted in Clark, 
Dp. 574- 

2 It is interesting to note that whereas the New England states in 1869 held 
only 40 to 50 per cent of the woolen manufacture, they contained between 75 and 
80 per cent of the cotton-manufacturing industry, as measured by spindleage. 
As early as 1853 Wallis noted: ‘‘Whilst the cotton manufacture is located 
more exclusively in the Eastern States, the woolen manufacture is extended 
in almost equal proportions over the whole of the Middle States, and extends 
itself into the western regions and toward the South” (British Documents, 1854 
[x717], p. 16). 


GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 273 


gether with the growth of cities in the West, the force of these 
factors was moderated; but always they have been of some in- 
fluence. Even today the larger part of the clothing industry, in- 
cluding women’s with men’s clothing, is still in the East. Again, 
the textile-machine industries arose in the eastern states. From 
the time that Pliny Earle and his competitors set up the produc- 
tion of card-clothing around Leicester, Massachusetts, in the last 
years of the eighteenth century, and from the time that a group 
of machine-builders arose in Worcester, Massachusetts, and in 
Philadelphia, respectively, the tendency for producers of tex- 
tile machinery to locate in the eastern states has been 
steady. 

A third factor relates to the facilities for the purchase of raw 
materials. The early manufacturers, one will recall, sought after 
their wool by journeys through the countryside, by offers to ex- 
change cloths for wool, and by similar devices. But rather soon 
the evolution of a specialized trade of wool dealers began; and in 
this development Boston played an important role. For example, 
as early as 1828, one James Vila was conducting a wool warehouse 
at 1 Bath Street, near Hancock, Boston; and by the fifties there 
were about fifteen wool merchants located in Boston.! Moreover, 
as the years passed, Boston came to hold an ever-expanding posi- 
tion in relation to the total wool dealings of the country. In the 
swelling importations of foreign staple, the city was coming to 
have a particularly large share. By the years around 1870, Bos- 
ton merchants were securing 40 per cent of the import movement 
_in wool of all sorts;* while of the domestic clip, they were sup- 
posed in these years to be receiving at least a third.’ 

Finally, the element of labor supply should be noted. Popu- 

1 Shaw, “‘The Wool Trade of the United States:” 61st Cong., 1st Sess., Senate 


Documents, No. 70, pp. 29, 42, 52. This account is most fragmentary and extends 
only to 1870. 

2 The total importation of wool (including carpet wools) increased ten-fold be- 
tween 1830 and the decade of the fifties. By the seventies this movement had 
again expanded, until it was now over three-fold the figure of the fifties. f 

3 Boston Board of Trade, Report for 1872, p. 23. This was probably an under- 
estimate. Comparison of receipts of wool at Boston during the early seventies, 
with the total domestic clip (as estimated), indicates a ratio of over 40 per 
cent. 


274 THE MATURE FACTORY 


lation was greater in the East than in the West or South, and 
it was more concentrated. Not only were the growing cities a 
broadening market for the products of the wool manufacture, 
but they also served a good recruiting ground for mill help. 
Moreover, immigrants were strongly inclined to settle in the 
older communities, especially in the New England and middle- 
Atlantic states, and these foreigners contributed in this period 
a large contingent to the working force of American wool-manu- 
facturing establishments. 

With opportunities of special value as regards purchase of raw 
material, supply of machinery, supply of labor, and sale of 
finished product, obviously there was reason to expect an effect 
sooner or later upon the localization of the wool manufacture in 
New England or at least in the eastern states. And, indeed, for 
these or for other reasons, such localization did at last take 
place. The westward movement ceased between 1869 and 1879 
(see above tabulation), and subsequently the East, especially 
New England, has secured a constantly stronger position in the 
industry, — of which more later. 

On the other hand, the worsted manufacture had by 1869 
already become localized, — indeed, localized in a higher degree 
than it is today. The newly acquired industry was to a peculiar 
extent concentrated in Massachusetts. While only 35 mills out 
of a reported total of 102 were situated in the state, these 
mills contained 118 out of the whole 161 combs given for the 
country.’ Such might perhaps be considered a natural condi- 
tion for a young industry, especially when the products of that 
industry were confined to a rather limited range.” With a greater 
maturity and with an increased diversity of output, some greater 

1 Some of the establishments reported by the Census of 1870 as worsted mills 
were apparently engaged solely or largely upon woolen goods. Thus for New York 
State, seven establishments were indicated, containing one comb but eight sets of 
carding machinery. Similarly, Pennsylvania’s thirty-one mills held only twenty 
combs but seventy-four sets of cards. The confusion of the two branches will later 
be seen to have occurred quite frequently in the earlier days. 

2 In part the concentration of the worsted manufacture in 1870 may be explained 
on the basis of the supply of capital. The new worsted mills called for considerable 


capital investment and would tend to seek those areas where capital was most 
plentiful, that is, the eastern states. 


GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 275 


geographical distribution took place. In part this movement 
was caused by the adaptation of the newer branches to conditions 
in the several sections of the country, and in part by the changes 
In our general economic status; but it never led to a geographical 
dispersion for the worsted branch that was as great as in the case 
of the woolen manufacture. 

3. A third important feature of the industry’s development be- 
tween 1830 and 1870 was the growth in size of the representative 
establishment. While this phase of the development will be 
touched upon frequently in the succeeding pages, we may here 
note the evidence which statistical data have to present. On ac- 
count of the relatively recent development of the worsted manu- 
facture prior to 1870, consideration of that branch may for the 
present be omitted. In the woolen end, the number of workers 
per establishment according to the earliest figures available, those 
of 1840, was only fifteen. By 1869, the average had increased to 
twenty-eight per establishment, or nearly 100 per cent. In num- 
ber of sets per mill there had also been advance, although such 
information runs back only to 1845. In the latter year, according 
to Graham, the establishments of the country averaged only 1.7 
sets, but twenty-five years later this figure had increased to 2.9 
sets. Yet such data do not tell the whole story. One must 
examine the several sections of the country, at least as far as 
possible. 

The situation in the western communities is particularly sig- 
nificant, not only because it mirrors in a measure the preceding 
development in the East, but because it explains why the average 
for the country in number of employees or sets per establishment 
did not increase as rapidly as one would expect in the forty-year 
period now under discussion. As already intimated, the western 
woolen mills were chiefly small affairs. In 1845, apparently there 
were few western mills indeed with more than one set of machin- 
ery. Even Ohio’s seventy-nine mills were reported by Graham to 
contain but ninety-seven sets. As late as 1869, too, the average 
size of western woolen establishments was stilllow. For the whole 
area of the Ohio and upper Mississippi valleys, the mills averaged 
less than two sets apiece, although New England factories could 


276 THE MATURE FACTORY 


boast an average of five to six sets, — and more productive sets, 
too. Furthermore, the connection of these establishments with 
the local markets remained intimate. A western writer states in 
1870 that manufacturers in that region ‘“‘buy their wool and sell 
their cloth near home. In some cases, they exchange as much as 
70,000 pounds of wool in a year directly with the farmers for 
cloth.” ? And an inquiry in 1876 elicited frequent remarks from 
western mills such as ‘‘we sell our own goods at the mill,” or 
“‘goods made for home consumption.” * Mr. John L. Hayes, 
moving spirit and first secretary of the National Association of 
Wool Manufacturers, summarized the situation when he reported 
of western producers: that they were ‘‘confident that if they 
did not attempt to make their mills too large, and continued 
to seek their principal markets in the counties and local 
districts where they are established, . . . they should be pros- 
perous.”’ ® 

On the other hand, the period 1830 to 1870 had witnessed the 
development of production on a substantially larger scale in the 
eastern states. By 1830 the evolution of fair-sized mills was al- 
ready an important feature in the eastern, and especially in the 
New England manufacture; and this movement proceeded with 
no appreciable pause in the subsequent period. The equipment 
of New England woolen mills was reported by Benton and Barry 
in 1837 to average a little more than two and a quarter sets per 
establishment. By 1859 this average had risen to over four sets, 
and by 1869, as already stated, to five and one half sets. That the 
increase was not more rapid nor more decided may be attributed 
to the slower development of Vermont, New Hampshire, and 
Maine, where mills retained somewhat the same character that 
western mills possessed. In Massachusetts alone, where the in- 
dustry was most highly developed, the mills had averaged two 
and three-quarters sets apiece in 1836; by 1845, according to 
Graham, they had increased that average to nearly three and one- 
half; while by 1869 they had attained an average of over seven 

1 Bulletin, 1870-1871, p. 450. 


2 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 443. 
3 Bulletin, 1870-1871, p. 217. 


GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRY 277 


and one-third sets.’ Similarly, in number of employees per mill, 
the Massachusetts establishments were drawing away from the 
rest of the country. The average for the country in 1840 had been 
fifteen, and in 1869 only twenty-eight; but Massachusetts, al- 
ready possessing approximately thirty-seven per mill in 1837, had 
increased that figure to nearly eighty-five by 1865. This section 
of the country, moreover, was destined to become of even greater 
significance as the site of large establishments, and its experience 
serves as advance notice of subsequent experience for the country 
as a whole. Indeed, it is significant to add that for the whole 
country the year 1870 was in this matter of average size of mill 
as in other considerations a real dividing line. Forces were gath- 
ering, and in fact had been slowly and inconspicuously increasing 
in vigor since the commencement of the industry in this country, 
which were to lead in the following decades to a substantial 
change in the preéxisting situation. ‘The number of individual 
establishments was destined to decline from the high-water mark 
of 2891 mills in 1869, until it reached a low point of 5or in 1914; 
and meanwhile the number of employees per mill — and other 
similar indices of size — was to rise rapidly. The smallest mills 
tended to drop out, both in the East and West, and despite the 
advantages of small-scale production, improvements in tech- 
nique and administration allowed an appreciable growth in the 
size of the representative concern. 

Finally, we may return to a brief notice of the worsted manu- 
facture. Accurate evidence concerning the increase in number 
and size of establishments does not run back far; and yet such as 
exists does indicate that the years around 1870 were for this man- 
ufacture as much a turning point as they were for the woolen 
branch. From the three or four mills which were turning out 
worsted goods in 1830,” increase in number apparently was slow 


1 Between 1837 and 1845 the increase in size of Massachusetts mills is better 
shown in the following comparison: 


1-set 2-set 3-4 set Over 4-set 
pice ley 8 AS Oi ec aaa 70 45 49 19 
Bt ME Atri Tie v5). a, | « Bin 49 33 34 25 


(Benton and Barry, and Graham.) 
* See above, p. 153. 


278 THE MATURE FACTORY 


until the fifties; but even by 1859 probably not over ten or a 
dozen mills were wholly or principally engaged on this type of 
work.'! Thereafter came a prodigious outburst of activity, the 
number of establishments jumping to 102 in 1869, — according 
to the Census for that year. The succeeding decade witnessed 
a decrease to 76; and then came a steady increase until 1909. 
The years before 1870 were years of growth partaking somewhat 
of a hothouse character; and then came a period of maturing and 
acclimatization, so to speak, which rendered possible a subsequent 
era of renewed expansion. Even in the decade of the seventies the 
number of combs in worsted mills increased from 161 in 102 mills, 
to 288 in 76 establishments; and the number of employees from 
an average of 127 per establishment to one of 247. In short, at 
the time when the woolen industry was drawing free of the con- 
ditions which the westward expansion and the slow and uncertain 
growth of a half century or more had imposed, the younger 
worsted branch was just recovering from the overextension in- 
duced by a rather impetuous development. In this respect, as in 
many others, the course of development in the two branches of the 
wool-manufacturing industry supplies interesting and significant 
contrasts. 


1 The Census of 1860 reports only three establishments in the worsted manu- 
facture, but, as will appear later, this figure is inaccurate. 


CHAPTER XIV 
THE DECLINE IN HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 


To the sketch above given of the growth of factory production in 
the American wool manufacture may be contrasted another, 
which in a large measure is the complement of the first, — the 
decline in the household output of wool fabrics. With respect to 
the period up to 1830 it was observed that while the household 
industry was declining in some parts of the country, there were 
evidences of much vigor in other sections. By 1870, however, 
the forces of decay had changed the whole aspect of that pro- 
duction. 7 

The earlier decades, the thirties and forties, manifested sub- 
stantially less change than the subsequent period. References to 
the household production, to be sure, become less and less fre- 
quent throughout this time, but this is in part explicable on the 
basis of the peculiar interest evoked by the new factories, and in 
part by the disappearance of the household system from the 
regions nearer the towns. The statistics of New York State, for 
example, indicate a decline of only a third in the family manu- 
facture of wool fabrics between 1825 and 1845.'! At the latter 
date, too, Fleischmann remarks that ‘‘in every state there exists 
still . . . many carding-mills, which prepare for spinning” the 


1 The data for New York State are as follows: 


1825 1835 1845 1855 1865 
(yards) (yards) (yards) (yards) (yards) 
Amount of fulled cloth mfd. in 
the domestic way ...... 2,918,000 2,184,000 1,664,000 198,000 259,000 
Amount of flannel and other non- 
fulled cloth similarly mfd. . . 3,468,000 2,790,000 2,650,000 380,000 632,000 


The figures for 1865 probably represent a recrudescence of household produc- 
tion stimulated by the patriotic sentiment — the desire to be useful — or by the 
exigencies of the Civil War. Thus the experiences of the War of 1812 were in some 
degree repeated, and, again, those of the World War — the knitting of socks and 
sweaters — were in a measure foreshadowed. The declining influence of succes- 
sive wars upon this family manufacture of wool goods is of peculiar interest. 


279 


280 THE MATURE FACTORY 







were = Erie Canal 


Fic. 7. 


Household Manufacture of Woolen Cloths in 
New York State, 1820 and 1845. eC 
Norte: In each case, the shaded area embraces that third of the counties in the State, which 


showed the highest per capita household production of woolen fabrics, including those goods in 
which wool was mixed with cotton or linen. 


THE DECLINE IN HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 281 


farmers’ wool.! And even as late as 1860, 712 carding and fulling 
mills were recorded by the Census, — and this was probably a 
serious underestimate.” 

But as Wallis suggested in 1854, the home manufacture was 
‘becoming daily more and more exceptional.”’* And this could 
hardly be otherwise with the growth in the factory production, 
the cheapening and improvement of its output, and with the 
advent of better distributive and more adequate transportation 
facilities.* The operation of these forces was so slow and incon- 
spicuous that a picture of the movement cannot often be caught. 
However, the figures of household production in New York 
State, though probably far from accurate of themselves, do give 
us an intimation of what must have been the experience of the 
country as a whole. In the accompanying maps, the shaded 
areas represent that third of New York counties which in the 
Censuses of 1820 and 1845, respectively, showed the heaviest 
per capita household production of woolen fabrics. It is evident 
that in 1820 the counties nearer the City of New York and those 
on the line of the Hudson River had already been affected by the 
domestic factory production or had been influenced by the im- 
portation of woolen goods; or, contrariwise, the counties with 
the highest household manufacture were those located at some 
distance from the distributive centers. It is also noteworthy that 
two counties which were among the heaviest wool-growing areas, 
Washington and Otsego, were also in this latter group. By 1845, 
however, a curious split had occurred. The counties of heaviest 
per capita production were now either in the northern, less well- 
developed section of the state, or along the southern border. To 
one at all familiar with the history of transportation the reason 
is plain. In the interval between 1820 and 1845 the Ene Canal 
had been completed, and some portions of railroads reaching out 
westward from Albany, both traversing counties which had now 


1 Fleischmann, p. 45. 

2 As late as 1880, 570 carding and fulling mills were reported in Census (ii, 
963). 

8 Wallis, Report, British Documents, 1854 [1717], p. 16. 

* As to the improvement of the distributive organization for wool cloth, see 
the following chapter. 


282 THE MATURE FACTORY 


ceased to have heavy per capita production. The introduction of 
transportation facilities had occasioned a decay in the household 
industry. 

But in explaining the general decline in family production in 
New York State, another factor should be added: the establish- 
ment within the region of many wool-manufacturing concerns, 
especially small enterprises dependent upon a strictly local 
market for their goods. The number of woolen mills had in- 
creased from 217 in 1825 to 345 in 1845, a high-water mark from 
which there was recession in subsequent decades. The expan- 
sion of wool-factory production before 1845 impressed Randall, 
together with the effect of this production upon household manu- 
facture. The number of carding-fulling establishments, those 
adjuncts to household work, “‘is decreasing in New York,” he 
says, “‘as manufactories of the common fabrics, worn by farmers 
and other laboring men, are increasing in every direction — many 
of them doing custom work either at the halves, or at a fixed sum 
per yard — and all of them exchanging cloth for wool. By either 
of these methods, the cloth can be obtained as cheaply, perhaps 
cheaper, than to manufacture it in families.” Small wonder, 
then, that there was a flagging interest in the premiums offered 
by the New York State Agricultural Society for domestic wool 
manufactures. Even as early as 1845 the officers reported with 
a regret which was apparently blind, that except in such articles 
as blankets and flannels ‘“‘there was but a meagre competition”’ 
at the Utica fair. The failure of competition was particularly 
noticeable in woolen cloth, ‘‘which ought to be a staple of home 
manufacture. Instead of fifty pieces being presented for pre- 
miums, which might be considered a moderate estimate, there 
were but two, and those manufactured by machinery!’”? The 
country was surely headed straight for destruction. But the 
course of development was already set, and by 1855 the vol- 
ume of household production as reported by the state census 
amounted to less than to per cent of the corresponding output in 
1825. 


1 Randall, Sheep Husbandry, 1848, p. 89. See also Fleischmann, p. 36. 
2 Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society, v, 154. 


THE DECLINE IN HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 283 


Such, in general, was the experience of other eastern commu- 
nities, although detailed information with regard to these others 
is much less adequate. The most concrete evidence relates to 
the number of fulling mills. While the Census of 1840 showed 
nearly 2300 such establishments in the eastern and middle states, 
that of 1860 reported only 160. In the seaboard southern states 
there was a somewhat similar movement, although apparently 
less rapid. With a more stable basis of the economic system, the 
change in methods of production or rather in sources of cloth 
supply was slower. Even as late as 1858 the Milledgeville 
(Georgia) Manufacturing Company was calling ‘‘the attention 
of the public to their new and improved machinery for carding 
wool and weaving kerseys.”! However, unquestionably the 
household manufacture in all the eastern area was in process 
of steady decline. 

Nor was the decline of household production in the eastern 
states accompanied by so considerable an expansion of such 
manufacture in the western communities as one might expect 
from the earlier history of the household industry in this country 
or from the westward expansion of the factory production. No 
doubt a substantial amount of household manufacture went on 
in the western states unnoted by contemporary writers because 
of its very normality: it was not worth mentioning. However, 
there are evidences that the manufacture in this manner did not 
have the prevalence nor the persistence there that it had had in 
the eastern regions. It is true that such manufacture of this 
type as did exist in 1860 was localized chiefly in the West and in 
the South (especially in the Southwest): of the 712 fulling and 
carding establishments reported by the Census of 1560, 328 were 
accredited to the western states and 217 to the southern. But 
references to home production in these communities are pecu- 
liarly infrequent; and the references that do occur are often 
inconclusive. Thus it was reported in 1854 that from the consid- 
erable production of yarn by Pennsylvania woolen mills, a large 
proportion went ‘‘for the supply of the West in the materials of 
home weaving;” but the note was appended that this industry 


1 Documentary History of American Industrial Soctety, ti, 330. 


284 THE MATURE FACTORY 


was declining steadily.’ Statistics of household manufacture in 
the western states in the years 1840-1860, while undoubtedly far 
from accurate, may yet be quoted to show the general trend. 
The only figures available cover all homemade manufactures. 
For this miscellaneous group of commodities, but including wool 
cloth, the per capita production in representative western states 
was in terms of value as follows: ? 


1840 1850 1860 
97 hs are Nae etre ts Aad neh! tt $1.22 $0.87 $0.26 
Kentucky 0) toe ee eae 3.36 2.50 1.81 
Indiana a0.-e eh eve meee 1.88.70 1.65 0.63 
TTTin Gis ic ate er nny 2.09 1.35 0.54 
MISSOUTL pu a ee 2.99 2.45 1.59 


Apparently the establishment of woolen mills followed rather 
closely upon the heels of settlement, or at least mills which, pro- 
viding an opportunity for wool carding or fulling, also carried on 
some production of cloths. Typical perhaps was the concern at 
Milledgeville, Georgia, just mentioned. While “to the public” 
it called attention to its new machinery for carding wool and 
weaving, the advertisement continued: “to Merchants, We 
recommend the kerseys of our own manufacture.” ? The erection 
of mills which manufactured on commission, bartered cloth for 
wool, and in other ways cultivated the local markets, in a con- 


1 Wallis’s Report, British Documents, 1854 [1717], p. 16. A diligent search of 
local material with regard to the West has yielded less than a half-dozen references 
to household production of woolen fabrics. Typical are the following: Riley, De- 
velopment of Chicago and Vicinity as a Manufacturing Center (p. 55), states that ‘‘a 
coarse cloth called linsey-woolsey was manufactured to a considerable extent in 
the homes throughout the territory” in the period prior to 1850. Again, in Wilson’s 
Description of Iowa, published in 1865 (p. 85), the need of ‘‘ woolen and fulling and 
carding mills” is mentioned, ‘‘to make the yarn required for dur woolen socks, 
making no allowance for that needed for domestic cloths for farmers’ use.”” Such 
statements taken in connection with the known spread of woolen mills through the 
West do not suggest a very widespread practice of household manufacture. 

2 Lippincott, Economic Development of the United States, p. 201. Itis noteworthy 
that in the more easterly states and the states with better transportation facilities, 
the per capita decline was greater than in the others. 

The total value of such manufactures manifests a decrease in the decade 1850- 
1860. For all the states above mentioned, the total values were as follows: 1840, 
$7,909,000; 1850, $8,633,000; and 1860, $6,585,000. 

3 Documentary History of American Industrial Society, ii, 330. For western mills, 
see discussion above. 


THE DECLINE IN HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION 285 


siderable measure cut the ground from under the household pro- 
duction, especially in the West where a more adequate supply 
of wool was available and where the development of these small 
factories was more frequent. 

Again, the improvement of transportation facilities came 
rapidly in the western regions, treading more closely upon the 
heels of settlement than was true of the East. To the freight 
route of the Mississippi River and its tributaries were added the 
more effective and more direct east-and-west lines of the Erie 
Canal and railroads. Such improvement meant much to the 
western farmer, particularly the possibility of substituting money 
crops for subsistence farming. ‘The farmer was no longer so re- 
stricted in his operations, but could now turn to the production 
of commodities which would command a wide market,. and in 
exchange for which he could purchase his requirements of cloths 
and of anything else from the industrial communities. 

In short, then, it seems probable that while household pro- 
duction of woolen cloths may possibly have played a substantial 
part in the thirties and forties, the subsequent decades saw a 
marked decline until by the seventies it was a negligible feature 
even of western economic life. 


CHAPTER XV 
CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION 


AmoNG the factors responsible for the expansion of the factory 
production of wool fabrics in the period now under consideration 
was, as already intimated, the development of a more stable and 
better integrated system of distribution. In some respects, this 
development was of course but a continuation of that which was 
shown occurring in the decades before 1830; but the future of 
the new system was not wholly clear at that time. In particular, 
the position of the rising system was then undermined by the 
auction sales method, which indeed was increasing in importance 
even as the “orthodox” system was feeling its way to a better 
codrdination; and peace in the distributive end of the wool 
manufacture would not be safe so long as the auction sale held 
such a substantial place. The course of the development in the 
decades before 1870, however, was something more than a re- 
moval of handicaps. In an important measure it marked the 
evolution of the modern avenues of distribution, the institution 
of new forms and methods by means of which wool fabrics were 
transferred more satisfactorily from mill to ultimate consumer. 

As just suggested, the suppression or elimination of the auction 
sales system was of necessity a primary step. All evidence, in 
fact, points to the view that this factor in the distributive system 
reached its zenith in the years around 1830, at least in so far as 
textiles are concerned. Statistics of the value of dry goods sold 
at auction in New York City, the chief auction center of the 
country, show a substantial decline between 1829-1831 and 1839- 
1841, the last years for which such figures are available. In the 
earlier three-year period, the sales of domestic dry goods had 
averaged $4,419,000 and of foreign dry goods, $10,125,000; while 
a decade later the quantities had diminished to $3,149,000 and 
$8,538,000, respectively.!. The decrease was obviously greater 

1 New York State, Report of Comptroller, 1842, pp. 130-131. 
286 


CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION 287 


in the case of domestic goods; and this situation would be antic- 
ipated, since the more orderly methods of distribution were more 
advantageous to domestic producers and the auction sales more 
attractive to the importer. 

In subsequent years, too, the position of the auction sale seem- 
ingly became not only relatively but absolutely less important. 
This is surely true in the case of imported fabrics. The Comp- 
troller of New York State in his report for 1849 called special 
attention to the falling off which had occurred in the auction 
duties during the preceding decades. Whereupon, with the lack 
of insight which is sometimes conspicuous in official quarters, he 
stated: “‘With an increasing population, and an increasing com- 
merce, it is incredible that there should be a decrease of sales by 
auction. How is this falling off to be accounted for?’’? And with 
reasoning in line with the rest of his argument, he fell back on 
the proposition that no doubt “‘it has arisen from fraud.”! This 
accusation elicited remonstrance from auctioneers and merchants, 
and in their responses there is much of interest in the present 
connection. The greater bulk of their testimony refers to im- 
ported goods, as already suggested, since articles of domestic 
produce and manufacture had been freed from auction duty in 
1846. With regard to foreign goods, however, besides stressing 
the substitution of domestic for foreign fabrics and the decline 
in value of textiles,? arguments against the Comptroller’s accu- 
sation asserted: that “the intercourse induced by steam navi- 
gation has brought together the agents of foreign commission 
houses and the jobbers of this country, thus lessening the induce- 
ments for a speculative or uncertain importation,” and that 
“‘many articles which were formerly sold at auction largely, are 
now ... sold through brokers.”’ Among these goods now sold 
through brokers, woolen fabrics were mentioned; and an elabo- 
rate summary was presented of the advantages to both seller and 
buyer flowing from “private sales.”” Furthermore, it was stated 
that ‘‘in Boston, the auction business is reduced in a greater 
ratio than in this city (New York). In Philadelphia there has 


1 New York Assembly Documents, No. 5, 1849, p. 88. 
2 The duties were assessed on an ad valorem basis. 


288 THE MATURE FACTORY 


also been a falling off. In Baltimore it amounts to nothing as 
compared with private sales.” + With such a situation in the 
distribution of imported fabrics, for which sale by auction would 
be more attractive than for domestic goods, it appears unlikely 
that the auction system in the latter connection could have main- 
tained any considerable sway. To be sure, there was no complete 
elimination of auction sales for domestic fabrics. Notices of 
auction sales appear from time to time. Indeed, what is said to 
have been till then the largest auction sale of woolen fabrics ever 
held in this country occurred in 1878. The increased manufac- 
turing capacity of the American industry derived from exten- 
sions of the Civil War period led finally to “‘so great a glut of 
production in blankets that the largest manufacturers of blankets 
found it indispensable to relieve the market by an auction sale 
in New York.” ? But episodes of this sort do not make a system. 
The position of the auction sale as an independent factor in the 
distribution of wool fabrics may be said to have declined stead- 
ily in the thirties and forties until by the succeeding decade 
that method had become a negligible feature of the marketing 
organization. 

The ‘“‘regular”’ method of distribution, developed in the pre- 
ceding period, experienced some important changes during the 
years that followed. With the expansion and diversification of 
textile manufacture in this country came a specialization in the 


1 New York Assembly Documents, No. 218, 1840, pp. 8, 12. 

Among other reasons noted was the ‘‘facility of bonding merchandise, enabling 
importers to hold from the hammer the surplus, at least until the market is pre- 
pared to take it for distribution in the regular mode of private sale as demanded for 
the immediate consumption of the country”’ (p. 8). 

Private sales are alleged to be to the interest of owner and of commission mer- 
chant, because the former gets more for his goods and the latter receives his full 
commissions, which apparently he had otherwise to split with the auctioneer. Then 
“the buyer prefers to buy at private sale, because he gets a credit of from eight to 
ten months, instead of six, a great convenience to the jobbers of dry goods, who are 
obliged to give very long credits to their country customers without any positive or 
fixed period of payment” (p. 12). 

On the decline in importance of auction sales generally, see Westerfield, Early 
History of American Auctions, p. 208. 

2 Bulletin, 1881, p. 386. See also Hayes, Report on Exhibition of 1876, p. 40, 
giving a case of an auction sale of flannels; it was “‘by a single house” representing 
157 sets of machinery in different mills, and netted $2,500,000. 


CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION 289 


distributive system, placed by one writer in the decade of the 
forties. The classification of goods was carried to a finer point 
than theretofore, and commission merchants arose who handled 
distinct lines such as cloths and cassimeres, or silks and dress 
goods. Moreover, the relation between mills and particular 
dealers became closer. During the first part of the period under 
consideration, it was frequent, and perhaps usual, for manufac- 
turers to sell through several commission houses. Thus, the Pon- 
toosuc Manufacturing Company of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, in 
1835 was doing business with four concerns, though one of them, 
Hutchinson & Tiffany of New York, handled three-quarters of 
the sales. Again, S. Slater & Sons Company, of Webster, Massa- 
chusetts, in the forties and fifties, dealt chiefly with four or five 
houses, but sent smaller weights to three or four other concerns. 
The Stevens mill in Andover, Massachusetts, at about this period 
operated in a similar fashion, though in a typical year such as 
1844 consignments were made to as many as nineteen concerns 
with amounts running from 14 to 1428 pieces.” But already 
change was coming in the trade. When the Middlesex Manu- 
facturing Company was established in 1830, Lawrence, Stone & 
Company became the selling agents.* The sales of the Hamilton 
Woolen Company, founded in 1831 under that name, were subse- 
quently handled by the wholesale house, Tiffany, Sayles & 
Hitchcock, which had taken over the enterprise in the preceding 

1 Beach, ‘‘ Dry Goods Trade,” in Depew, Hundred Years of American Commerce, 
p. 556. The writer makes the exception of “the regular dry-goods jobbing houses”’ 
in his statement that “‘the general trade, both wholesale and retail . . . began to 
make more or less separate distinctions in the goods which it sold.” 

2 Records of Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company, S. Slater & Sons Company, 
and M. T. Stevens and Sons Company. The Slater and Stevens mills had earlier 
shown a tendency to trade with only one selling house. Why they shifted back to 
the use of several agents, does not appear. Where so many houses are mentioned, 
it may be that the data in the records refer to shipments rather than consignments, 
i. e., shipments on advice of the regular selling houses; or they may refer to sales 
direct to jobbing houses or even perhaps retailers. Variation from the “‘regular” 
method of distribution does not seem wholly unusual. Of the Hamilton Woolen 
Company it is said that ‘“‘in very early days it is apparent that goods were fre- 
quently shipped to nearby markets, such as Hartford and Albany (instead of to 
Boston), and some of the correspondence was direct with local merchants in these 


centers” (private letter from an official of the Company). 
8 Middlesex Manufacturing Company, Report of 1897, p. 3. 


290 THE MATURE FACTORY 


year.! Apparently other manufacturing concerns followed in this 
lead, although data in this matter are scarce. At least by the 
sixties, the practice seems to have become quite general for a 
selling house to be the exclusive selling agency for a given mill. 
Pomeroy, Adams & Company of New York were described as 
“agents” for the Rock Manufacturing Company and the Hock- 
anum Company, both of Rockville, Connecticut, and for the 
North Adams Woolen Company of North Adams, Massachu- 
setts; and similarly A. T. Stewart & Company, long a prominent 
house in the dry-goods trade, was agent for a group of mills, in- 
cluding the Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company, above men- 
tioned, and the Utica Steam Woolen Mills, of Utica, New York.” 
In general, as the trade in wool fabrics became more specialized 
and as the ‘‘regular”’ system of distribution became better estab- 
lished, the employment of special selling agents grew to be the 
dominant feature of selling practice on the part of domestic 
mills; and, one may add, this custom has continued to form an 
important feature of selling practice since that time. 

There were a few instances of a phenomenon, sale through a 
mill agency or direct selling, which became of particular signi- 
ficance only in more modern times. In the crisis of 1857, the 
Middlesex Company found itself in a bad way by virtue of the 
‘“‘mistakes and irregularities’ of its selling house, Lawrence, 
Stone & Company. To free the company from possible future 
embarrassment flowing from the same source, provision was made 
in the following year that the mill’s production should be sold 
through the office of the treasurer. As Cowley remarked, “‘ Until 
now, all our manufacturing companies had sold their products 
through commission houses in Boston and New York, whose 
compensation was determined by the gross amount of the sales, — 
not by the amount of the profits;”’ and the Middlesex Company 
now substituted a method whereby not only was the business of 
selling kept directly under the control of the Company, but the 
interest of the selling agent was made for the most part identical 


1 Brief record of the Hamilton Woolen Company (manuscript). 

2 Bulletin, 1869, pp. 352-370. There is evidence of the ownership of woolen mills 
by selling houses: e. g., that of the Fitchburg Woolen Mill by Rufus S. Frost & 
Company of Boston, wholesale merchants and selling agent for this mill. 


CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION 291 


with that of the enterprise! This example was followed by a 
few other concerns. For instance, S. Slater & Sons Company is 
said to have begun selling its own goods in 1866, and the treasurer 
of the Assabet Manufacturing Company, of Assabet, Massachu- 
setts, is reported in 1869 as its selling agent.?, But apparently 
this type of organization was rather exceptional before 1870. 
With the growth of larger manufacturing units in subsequent 
decades, the increase in direct selling came as an appropriate 
corollary. 

But too much attention might readily be paid to the wholesale 
end of the distributive system. Essential to the orderly market- 
ing of fabrics were the jobbers, although, unfortunately, of these 
merchants little definite information is available. During the 
greater part of this period they undoubtedly were the most im- 
portant, perhaps in the early days almost the sole customers of 
the commission houses; and as such they are said to have “ruled 
the trade.’”’* At first they apparently were located exclusively in 
the chief eastern commercial centers, Boston, New York, Phila- 
delphia, and Baltimore, where they stood in convenient geo- 
graphical interposition between the commission houses or selling 
agencies and the scattered retail stores of the East. However, 
when the area of sale for eastern products increased with the 
expansion of internal commerce, jobbing houses were estab- 
lished in the larger interior cities, e. g., Chicago and St. Louis, 
and trade in wool fabrics for the western region went largely 
through their hands. To be sure, the erection of wool-working 
mills in the West during the period before 1870, — mills which 
turned out goods especially suited to their local clientéles, — 
handicapped the development of a nation-wide distributive sys- 
tem. But ultimately these enterprises were destined to give 
way before the growing competitive strength of eastern mills; 
and by 1860 even, the products of the latter were already serv- 
ing a much broader market than they commanded, say, at the 
close of our previous period. 

1 Cowley, History of Lowell, 1868, p. 54. See also Reports of the Company for 
1857 and 1858; and North, Bulletin, 1902, p. 318. 


2 Slater Mills at Webster, 1812-1912, p. 33; Bulletin, 1869, p. 370. 
3 Bulletin, 1873, p. 128. 


292 THE MATURE FACTORY 


With the increase in size of market area for eastern cloths 
came the evolution of a somewhat more complex system of dis- 
tribution than that which had previously sufficed. In the earlier 
decades, it seems to have been the custom for the country store- 
keepers to come to the shops of the New York and other eastern 
cloth sellers; and to some extent this practice continued. As 
late as 1853, Greeley speaks of ‘“‘the country merchants” as 
present in New York during October of that year ‘“‘busily select- 
ing their winter stock.” + But subsequently the commercial 
traveler developed in this trade as he did in others, and the 
selling houses sought out the retailer. Possibly the rise of the 
commercial traveler was due in part to the efforts of eastern 
jobbers to keep control of the whole domestic market. If so, 
that device was not sufficient for the end in view; and, as I 
have just indicated, later decades saw the appearance of western 
jobbing houses. Finally, one may note the rise of a new dis- 
tributive agency in the eastern centers. To serve as intermedi- 
aries between western jobbers and the eastern mills, certain 
houses which had heretofore been doing a simple jobbing busi- 
ness in a more restricted field, seem to have set themselves up 
as wholesalers or general dry-goods jobbers. Such general job- 
bing houses were at first located wholly in eastern cities, notably 
in New York — where indeed they were always most numerous 
— but later they put in appearance in the larger western centers. 
And such wholesalers apparently had by 1870 become significant 
factors in the distributive organization. Accordingly, commis- 
sion houses, selling agencies, general jobbers, local jobbers, and 
retailers all took part by the sixties and seventies in the trans- 
mission of wool fabrics from the mills to the ultimate consumer. 

The ‘‘regular”’ distributive system as elaborated and developed 
by the middle of the century, however, was hardly established 
before the rise of new forces began to disturb its symmetry. 
One such force was the rise of the wholesale clothing industry. 
In the middle thirties came the first stirrings of this manufacture 


1 Art and Industry at the Crystal Palace, p. 229. 
* Beach, in Depew’s Hundred Years of American Commerce (p. 556), mentions. 
the development of the “‘commercial traveller system.”’ 


CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION 293 


and trade. Beginning with the production of overcoats, the in- 
dustry grew rapidly despite a setback in the crisis of 1837, re- 
ceiving encouragement subsequently from the California demand 
after the gold discoveries, and particularly from the army require- 
ments during the Civil War and those of demobilized soldiers 
immediately afterwards. It was also aided by the invention and 
introduction of labor-saving machinery, notably the Singer sew- 
ing machine, devised in 1850, but also a button-holing machine, 
and, scarcely less important than the sewing machine, that for 
cutting the cloth, invented by Isaac Fenno about 1870. As yet 
the industry had not developed the localization and intimate 
connection with city slums which later blackened its history; 1 
but by 1870 it had become a distinctly important industry, 
promising yet bigger things in the future. Statistics of the whole- 
sale clothing industry bear out this impression. Between 1849 
and 1869, the number of establishments increased from 4278 to 
9705, and the value added by manufacture from $22,581,451 to 


$67,595,752. 
The influence of this development upon the American wool 


manufacture can hardly be overemphasized, its effect upon the 


1 A considerable amount of “‘putting-out”’ existed in the industry down into the 
seventies, the employment by Boston houses extending ‘‘into New Hampshire, 
Vermont, and Maine, and particularly the latter state... . A single large concern 
in the city will employ as many as forty or fifty firms, in all parts of New England, 
who undertake (being supplied with the cut cloth and trimmings) to return the 
garments made up and ready for the warehouse. One of these firms will sometimes 
employ as many as eight hundred persons” (Bulletin, 1873, p. 132). 

However, one writer instances ‘‘the cheap labor of women and indigent foreign- 
ers” as one means enabling “‘the dealers in ready-made clothing to undersell their 
rivals” (Winslow, Biographies of Philadelphia Merchants, p. 92), and Kettell speaks 
of immigrants, ‘‘Germans and others,” as taking in sewing, and of some of the 
abuses which we would now cover by the general term “sweating” (Ezghty Years’ 
Progress, p. 310). 

For other accounts of the early industry, see Greeley, Great Industries of the 
United States, 1872, p. 590; Winslow, Biographies of Philadelphia Merchants, 1864, 
p. 92; Browning, ‘‘Clothing and Furnishing,” in Depew, One Hundred Years of 
American Commerce, pp. 562-565; Kettell, Eighty Years’ Progress, p. 310; Hayes, 
Bulletin, 1873, pp. 135-137; and Census of 1860, iii, p. lxiv. 

2 These figures refer only to the manufacture of men’s clothing. Even as late 
as 1880 the manufacture of women’s clothing was confined almost entirely to cloaks 
(Census of Manufactures, 1914, ii, 187). 


294 THE MATURE FACTORY 


scale of operation in the industry, upon the quality of product, 
and upon commercial practices in the trade. At present, the 
development is important from yet another aspect. The rise of 
the cutting-up industry brought about a significant change in the 
distributive organization. It was recognized in 1860 that the 
‘“‘wholesale clothing merchants” united “the jobbing: business 
with that of manufacturers and dealers in clothing on a large 
scale,” i. e., they overreached the jobber and squeezed him out. 
That this evolution of direct selling did not take place without 
opposition on the part of the established system is apparent in 
an account of that period written by Mr. John L. Hayes. Speak- 
ing in 1873, he said: ‘‘Clothing manufacturers in Boston, and 
not old men either, remember the time when they could not, on 
any terms, purchase their cloths directly of the commission houses 
selling the goods of American mills. At that time, the jobbing 
houses were the most important customers of the commission 
houses; and the jobbers refused to purchase of the commission 
houses which dealt directly with the clothier.” And, for a time, 
the jobbers seemingly had their way. But they could not stave 
off the inevitable. As the clothing industry increased in scale 
and the possibilities of that industry as purchaser of goods became 
more obvious, the desire of the wholesale clothiers was bound to 
secure more attention. Indeed, by the era at which Hayes was 
writing, he found that ‘‘no customers are more eagerly sought for 
by the agents of the mills, than the now rich and powerful cloth- 
ing houses.’”’? From the overcoats, and then the linen dusters and 
summer suits, the production of the clothing industry had broad- 
ened until it covered practically the same field as it does at present 
in so far as men’s garments are concerned. The trade in women’s 
suits and dresses had hardly commenced, and therefore the sale of 
dress-goods remained almost wholly in the hands of the jobbers. 

The development of intimate relations between wholesale 
clothiers and the selling agents for the mills was fruitful of im- 

1 Census of 1860, iii, p. lxiv. 

2 Bulletin, 1873, p. 128. The use of the words “‘agents of the mills” in this con- 
nection suggests that this type of sales organization was not unknown at that 


time, although no attempt is here made to differentiate the “agents’’ from the 
re tee houses.”’ 


CHANGES IN MARKET ORGANIZATION 295 


portant results. Not all were beneficial to mill operations. The 
jobber had stood as a sort of buffer between the manufacturer 
and the retailer, between the distinctly industrial process and 
that section of the distributive operations most closely related 
to the consumer. He collected the individually small orders of 
the retailers and transmitted them in terms of individually siz- 
able commands to the cloth manufacturer, — and, incidentally, 
commands that were firm and dependable. If business condi- 
tions changed for the worse subsequent to the placement of the 
orders, the jobbers were accustomed to keeping their word and 
themselves shouldering the losses. On the other hand, the de- 
velopment of the wholesale clothing trade meant, especially at 
first, a multiplication of orders for the cloth producers and a 
diminution in the average size of orders. Later, to be sure, 
consolidations among establishments in this trade tended toward 
an increase in the scale of operations on the part of clothing 
manufacturers, particularly as far as standard types and quali- 
ties of clothing were concerned, and a consequent increase in the 
size of order to the cloth-producing mills. But it is doubtful 
whether this latter tendency had much influence before 1870. 
Diversity of product and small unit orders seem to have pre- 
‘vailed, — perhaps, indeed, with the clothing manufacturers 
themselves stimulating the tendency in this direction by their 
competition in opening a new and still uncertain market. 
Secondly, the clothing trade came ultimately, and perhaps had 
by 1870 already come, to indulge itself in more frequent cancel- 
lation of orders to cloth producers than had been the practice 
of the old-time jobbers. Such a worsening of trade ethics 
signified increased difficulties for the cloth mills. 

But consequences of this new development advantageous to 
cloth production were not lacking. Inspection of fabrics was 
carried out more systematically and thoroughly than had been 
the case when the jobbing houses were the immediate purchasers; 
and this change could not fail to have marked effect in spurring 
the mills to more efficient and careful operation. Secondly, there 
unquestionably was a cheapening in the costs of distributing wool 
cloths, as conversion of fabrics into consumable form was more 


296 THE MATURE FACTORY 


directly accomplished. At least one middleman with his profits 
and his costs of handling was eliminated. 

The results of these changes were in part evident at once, that 
is, in the events and experiences of the American wool manu- 
facture during the period before 1870. Of the trend toward 
diversity in mill production, sufficient is said in the ensuing 
chapter. Undoubtedly the alteration in methods of cloth distri- 
bution had an influence in this regard. But we may also note 
that the reduction in distributive costs together with the special 
activities of the wholesale clothiers which would tend to stim- 
ulate sales was a large factor in enhancing the use of factory- 
made cloths. These fabrics in the form of ready-to-wear 
garments could more effectively compete with the home-made 
cloths. And thus the growth of the wholesale garment industry 
was responsible in no small measure for the extraordinary de- 
cline in the production of the latter which marked the years of 
the mid-century. 


CHAPTER XVI 
INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 


WHILE the outstanding and distinctive feature of the period be- 
fore 1830 was the change in industrial organization based upon 
the expansion of the domestic market and upon the developments 
in technical equipment, that of the period between 1830 and 1870 
is unquestionably the increasing diversity in the production of 
domestic mills, equally dependent upon the broadening of the 
home market and the improvement in technique. The growth 
of the country, the improvement in transportation facilities, and 
the decline in household manufacture had given an impetus to the 
factory production of goods in greater variety. And of hardly 
less importance to the same end were the increasing prosperity of 
the country, the increasing differences in wealth, and the rise of 
the wholesale clothing industry ready to capitalize changes in 
fundamental conditions. A hundred years before, even fifty 
years before, the market for “merchantable” cloth had been 
restricted to the moderately prosperous classes of the colonial 
towns. By 1870, however, practically the whole nation served 
as the market for factory goods, except for the steadily dwindling 
minority which insisted upon fabrics of foreign origin. Farmer 
and city housewife, mechanic and well-to-do merchant, were now 
within the reach of the expanding factory output. On the other 
hand, increased diversity of production was possible only after 
the invention of new, or the improvement of old machinery. 
Fancy goods could be turned out on the spinning machines, and 
particularly on the looms of, say, 1820. Increasing diversity of 
production, then, cannot be considered apart from the improve- 
ment in technical equipment. 

The contrast between the character of fabrics turned out by 
American mills in the twenties and thirties and that of goods 
produced in the early seventies is especially striking. The chief 
types of cloth in the earlier years were black and colored broad- 


297 


298 THE MATURE FACTORY 


cloths and cassimeres, satinets, flannels, and blankets, together 
with such low-quality articles as jeans, kerseys, and negro-cloths. 
Almost all these goods were made in solid colors only. Fineness 
of material and character of finish determined the relative quality 
of the fabric; and for the most part “variety of color and shade 
was the only element which the manufacturers had at command to 
satisfy the taste for change or caprice of fashion.” ! Before the 
Civil War, however, the outward appearance of American society, 
so to speak, had been transformed; indeed, the pendulum of 
change had swung to the other extreme. From a drabness which 
to the modern imagination would be depressing, style and pro- 
duction turned to a fancy, and to us an almost fantastic mood. 
As North puts it so well: ‘The ten years ending 1860 will always 
be remembered as a period when the styles and fabrics for men’s 
wear were of greater variety than ever before or since. Vests 
were made from brilliant patterned cassimeres, velvets, brocades, 
and silks, but rarely of the same material as the trousers. These 
last were plaids, checks, stripes, and mixtures, running largely to 
light and medium colors, and extravagant in pattern.” ? Note, 
too, the multiplicity of fabrics exhibited in 1869 at the 38th An- 
nual Exhibition of the American Institute at New York: not 
merely the old broadcloths and cassimeres, — the latter now in 
much diversity of structure, — but beavers, cashmeres, doeskins, 
meltons, cloakings, castors, astrakhans, and chinchillas, together 
with the whole new category of worsted fabrics, from serges, de- 
laines, and lustres, to armures, Italian cloths, poplins, and im- 
perial reps.* In fact, practically the whole modern range of 
woolen goods — excepting only light dress-goods — had been de- 

1 Hayes, Report on Exhibition of 1876, p. 40. See also Kittredge in Dry Goods 
Economist, 1896, p. 81. 

* North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 350. Exception to the above statements should un- 
doubtedly be made as far as the more conservative elements of the community are 
concerned — the professional and more substantial business men — who persisted 
in the use of broadcloth made up into Prince Albert coats, until the seventies or 
later. However, already by the close of our present period, 1870, change in the 
habits of these elements of the population was at least beginning. 

3 Bulletin, 1869, pp. 352-370. Cf. also Report on Wool and Manufactures of Wool, 


1887, p. xlvili; the Jacquard attachment was brought into use to supply the “very 
ultra styles” made in this period. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 299 


veloped by 1870, and in large measure the modern variety of 
lustrous worsted fabrics. The introduction of light dress-goods 
of woolen structure, together with the elaboration of the worsted 
branch, especially in the lines of men’s-wear coatings and the soft 
dress-goods for women’s wear, held over until the next decades. 

In this matter of increased diversity in output, however, as in 
size of establishment and in other respects, a distinction must be 
made between eastern and western mills. The former were the 
concerns which felt most directly and strongly the effects of the 
expanding and broadening market; and the latter pursued their 
way with little change. Fleischmann’s descriptions of output in 
the several western states are indicative of the manufacture there 
as late as 1845: Ohio, “ Kentucky-jeans, satinets, and blankets;”’ 
Kentucky, “‘jeans, kerseys, and negro-cloths;” and Illinois, 
“satinets, coarse cassimeres, and negro-cloth for the St. Louis 
market.” To a considerable degree, moreover, this coarse 
manufacture persisted. As the western area developed, there 
was, to be sure, the attempt at finer production, but throughout 
this period such fabrics as linseys, satinets, flannels, blankets, and 
coarse cassimeres formed the predominant output of these mills.” 
In short, the production was modified and directed to satisfy 
the requirements of the western consumers, who for the most 
part had no need of, and could not well afford to buy, the finer 
fabrics demanded by the eastern communities. 

But without losing sight of the western situation, one can de- 
vote special attention to the more striking changes in the East. 
Particular note may be made of the introduction of new fabrics 
into eastern production, and of the conditions, market or techni- 
cal, which facilitated such action; while incidentally considera- 
tion may be given to the less fortunate experience in the eastern 
trade of fabrics which earlier had played important rdles. The 


1 Fleischmann, p. 43. Similarly, Graham reported for Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, 
and Michigan: 


Establishments Sets 
IBroscclotmrandsKerseyimere: «2. .c5s) ot) Gove. o.oo cel ow die coeds I 2 
Kerseymeres, flannels, satinets, andtweeds .......4-+-+-e-. 42 43 
Heansgrandimesro-ClOtns space lace. «) @ fadcn ba oeseiis.- the ela fozents 46 61 


2 For a description of the more advanced manufacture, based upon the report of 
an exhibition in Chicago of 1868, see Western Monthly, i, 246. 


300 THE MATURE FACTORY 


degree to which conclusions thus reached may be held applicable 
to the western section of the country will, we know, be modified 
by the considerations already presented.! 


1. Broadcloth. 


Broadcloth is a fabric which passed through various fortunes in 
the decades which followed 1830. It was declining in relative 
importance when this period opened, being pressed by cassimeres, 
satinets, and flannels; but it still maintained a position of much 
prominence. Mills were not infrequently devoted to the manu- 
facture of this cloth, and for the country as a whole nearly a 
quarter of the machinery reported by Benton and Barry in 1837 
was accredited to this production. 

There is evidence, too, of some growth in the subsequent years, 
It was observed in 1846 that ‘‘manufacturers have prospered dur- 
ing the last few years, and the accumulation of capital which re- 
sults from prosperity, necessarily tends to those alterations and 
improvements in machinery which enable the manufacturer of 
woolen fabrics to produce articles of superior style and finish.” * 
As late as 1853 the increased use of broadcloth by the “lower 
classes’? was remarked in one account. Formerly this fabric had 
been the mark of a “‘gentleman;”’ but now ‘‘every sober mechanic 
has his one or two suits of broadcloth, and, so far as mere clothes 
go, can make as good a display, when he chooses, as what are 
called the upper classes.”’ * Records of individual mills go to sub- 
stantiate this view. The Slater establishment at Webster, after a 
fling at the newer fabrics, went back to the sole production of 
broadcloth, and at as high figures as before. The Middlesex 
Company at Lowell turned out 78,000 yards of broadcloth in 

1 The southern and southwestern sections of the country, obviously, are neg- 
lected. We are interested in sections as producing centers or regions, and these 
particular sections were in this regard too inconsequential for special consideration. 

2 Three hundred and forty-four sets out of a total of 1488; Benton and Barry, 
p. 124. See Niles, xliv, 267, and xlvi, 413; production at the Somersworth, New 
Hampshire, and Salmon Falls, New Hampshire, mills. 

3 New York State Agricultural Society, vi, 264. This effect of prosperity will be 
noted again in the later history of the industry. 


4 Art and Industry at the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 231. 
5 Records of S. Slater & Sons Company. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 301 


1836, whereas in 1848 this output had risen to 120,000 yards per 
year and in 1853 to 3000 yards per week.1 

However, despite some evidence to the contrary, evil days had 
in reality already come upon this manufacture. Not only was 
this type of fabric continually losing ground relative to the other 
portions of the American wool-manufacturing industry, — as will 
appear in the discussion of the other fabrics, — but after about 
1850 there was apparently an absolute decline. The Census of 
1845 and that of 1855 for Massachusetts indicated a decline in the 
broadcloth production from 1,022,000 yards to 760,000 yards. In 
an enumeration made in 1860, which indicated the employment of 
machinery in the mills of New England and New York, no men- 
tion at all was made of apparatus engaged upon the broadcloth 
manufacture;? and manufacturers writing in 1862 stated that 
the production of this fabric had practically disappeared.* Dur- 
ing the Civil War, there was a temporary reaction, to satisfy the 
military needs; but apparently that movement died away with 
the coming of peace. A decade later, it could be said that ‘‘super- 
fine broadcloths are now used only by a limited class, and by that 
class rarely, except for dress coats, which last for years.” * In- 
deed, since the middle of the century, the men’s-wear broadcloth 
has been really a specialty. Once the aim and hope of all leading 
American wool manufacturers, it has become a negligible factor 
in the output of the country, and its production is confined to a 
few mills.® 

The forces which brought about this alteration in the status of 
broadcloth manufacture were in the main the predominant forces 


1 Handbook for the Visitor to Lowell, pp. 44-45; Wallis, Report, British Documents, 
1854 [1717], p.16; Census of 1860, ili, p. xxxii. 

2 Hunt's Merchants’ Magazine, xlii, 381. 

3 Randall, Fine Wool Sheep Husbandry, p. 68, One writer is quoted that “I 
should not like to assert that there is not a broadcloth manufactory in New Eng- 
land, though I do not know of any machinery, now running, upon that kind of 
goods;” and a New York State manufacturer, that there were (in 1862) no broad- 
cloths being made in the United States, so far as he knew, except such as were being 
made for the army and navy, and a few cotton-warp cloths, called ‘‘ Union.” 

4 Hayes, Report on the Exhibition of 1876, p. 42. 

5 In the production of lower-grade fabrics adapted to special uses, such as police- 
men’s uniforms, there were evidences, according to Hayes, of much progress both 
in fabrication and cheapness on the part of American manufacturers (ibid.). 


302 THE MATURE FACTORY 


in the wool-manufacturing industry during this period. They 
touch upon the wool supply, technical development, style influ- 
ence, and the tariff. These forces, moreover, were operating upon 
a manufacture which had always been under a handicap, — the 
handicap that the production of this fabric is a particularly diffi- 
cult affair even among the various lines of wool-cloth fabrication. 
American mills had never been able to rival foreign producers in 
the quality and fineness and finish of their goods. Appreciation 
of the peculiar difficulties involved in the broadcloth manufacture 
and of the deficiencies in the American fabrics continued to be 
voiced in these later years. In 1848 the comparative disadvan- 
tage of American producers was recognized. ‘‘There are some 
twenty processes in the manufacture of broadcloth,” it was said, 
‘and it is difficult to do each and all well.” 1 As late as 1870, after 
decades of trial and effort, the manufacture could be held up as 
one in which “there is room for indefinite development and im- 
provement at almost every stage of production. The sorting can 
be made more nice and perfect; the washing and removal of the 
animal oil can be more thorough; the spinning can be carefully 
adjusted to the nature of the wool, and the quality or grade of 
goods in which it is to be wrought. In the fulling, and shearing, 
and steaming, also, the most careful manufacturer will find that, 
as perfectly as he may conduct his operations,” the West of Eng- 
land goods will surpass his in finish and in freshness of appearance 
after wear.” Yet this fabric had for the most part always been 
limited in its market to the classes which were especially critical, 
and which would pay any additional cost for the superior, foreign 
goods. In short, the broadcloth industry in this country had ever 
been especially vulnerable.® 

Let us turn to a consideration of the other factors which un- 
favorably affected this manufacture, — and first, to that of wool 


1 Hunt's Merchants’ Magazine, xix, 341. 

2 Greeley, Great Industries of the United States, p.g19. See also Art and Industry 
at the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 232. 

3 The Census of 1860 (iii, p. xxxiii) could state that ‘‘the manufacture of super- 
fine cloths has never obtained a permanent footing in the United States, although 
upwards of fifty mills, in 1845, made more or less broadcloth, some of it of fair 
quality.” 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 303 


supply. Despite the injection of better blood by the merino and 
Saxon ‘‘crazes,”’ the fine wool of American growth was generally 
inferior to that of the Continental flocks. Especially was this true 
of the wool from the Vermont or American merino, the fine-wool 
sheep which had been developed from the Spanish stock. This 
wool was of somewhat longer staple, but of only medium fineness. 
Though adapted to the manufacture of superior cassimeres or 
fine flannels, it was not suited to the production of the best broad- 
cloth. Moreover, there had been a decline in the numbers of 
Saxony sheep in the years after the middle thirties. Randall 
points out that the Saxony sheep paid best to the farmer during 
the years 1831-1837; and that thereafter the price conditions 
favored the American merino with its somewhat heavier but in- 
ferior fleece. According to Wright, some sheepmen, like William 
Jarvis, abandoned their Saxons before 1835, and others after the 
crisis of 1837; while in the state of Massachusetts, for which alone 
we have statistics, the number of such animals decreased be- 
tween 1837 and 1845 from 47,000 to 34,000. During these 
same years the percentage of all merino sheep in Massachusetts 
declined from 66 to 56 per cent; and this decline is apparently 
connected with another phenomenon of the times adverse to the 
maintenance of a domestic fine-wool supply, i. e., the growing 
demand for mutton. The fine-wool sheep, whether Saxon or 
American merino, possessed a poor carcass, and for mutton pur- 
poses a crossbred or English-breed sheep is a better animal. Sheep 
of the latter types increased in numbers in the late thirties and 
during the forties, curtailing the production of even lower-grade 
merino wool. To some extent, imported wool, especially from the 
Argentine, came in to supply the growing deficiency; but this was 
not a wholly satisfactory substitution, since the greater part of 
this Argentine wool was distinctly inferior to the representative 
European qualities.’ Thus, in short, the situation in the wool 

1 Randall, Fine Wool Sheep Husbandry, p. 92. 

2 Wright, Wool Growing and the Tariff, pp. 120-121. 

3 Wallis (Report, British Documents, 1854 [1717], p. 15) speaks of the La Plata 
wool as ‘‘coarse and cheap.”’ It was cheap, but most writers hold the wool there to 


have been improved by merino blood, and to have been in considerable measure of 
medium-fine quality. 


304 THE MATURE FACTORY 


supply was becoming increasingly worse for the manufacture of 
broadcloths. The industry lacked this foundation for fine cloth 
production.! | 
Contributing to an unsatisfactory condition with respect to the 
raw material were the tariff arrangements under the act of 1846. 
Under preceding tariffs it had been customary to provide appre- 
ciably higher rates for wool manufactures than for the raw fiber. 
Thus in the immediately preceding act, that of 1842, while wool 
valued at less than seven cents per pound — including almost all 
the wool from the La Plata — was dutiable at only 5 per cent ad 
valorem, wool manufactures with some exceptions, such as 
blankets, bore a duty of 40 per cent. This arrangement provided 
the manufacturing industry with considerable protection. Upon 
the assumption usually adopted that the cost of the raw material 
forms half the total cost of the cloth, protection to the industry 
would work out at 37% per cent. The tariff of 1846, however, 
eliminated this gap in rates: both raw wool and wool manufac- 
tures were included in the same schedule and taxed at the single 
rate of 30 per cent. This does not mean that all protection to the 
manufacturing industry was taken away, but, even on the basis 
just employed, the net protection would be reduced to 15 per cent. 
Under preceding tariffs such as those of 1824 and 1828, to be sure, 
the protection, figured on the same theoretical basis, had not been 
appreciably greater, but the substantial decrease from the pro- 


1 The Census of 1860 (iii, p. xxxiii) attributed the decline of the broadcloth manu- 
facture “in part to the quality of American wool, which, though equal in fineness 
to any in the world, is better adapted by its length of fibre for making soft woolen 
and worsted goods than fine cloths, which are improved in appearance by a shorter 
nap than can readily be imparted with native wool.” 

Yet perhaps a supply of fine wool adequate for the needs of the domestic broad- 
cloth manufacture may have existed in the United States. However, in so far as 
it could be more profitably used in some other manner, i. e., put to some alternate 
employment, the broadcloth branch would suffer. Moreover, the trend of fine- 
wool production may have caused a disparity between the prices of such staple 
and of other wools, sufficiently great to handicap broadcloth manufacture. 

Wright (p. 121) gives the main cause of the downfall of the Saxony sheep as the 
decline in the broadcloth manufacture. Apparently the big decrease did not come 
untilthen. I have tried to point out, however, that the movement of decline began 
before the broadcloth production had really been threatened. The decline on the 
industrial side simply accelerated the change on the side of sheep raising. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 305 


tection afforded by the act of 1842, coming just when it did, 
probably contributed to the decadence of this broadcloth manu- 
facture, dependent as that manufacture was in a particular degree 
upon tariff support. Not only was the actual protection measur- 
ably diminished, but the psychological effect of the decrease under 
the circumstances which surrounded the passage of the Walker 
tariff was distinctly bad. Hope of subsequent reversal in policy 
under the existing political situation was bound to be faint; and 
application of “‘free trade,” it was thought, might be made more 
thorough. 

Yet there were influences more important than tariff or wool 
supply. Mr. John L. Hayes, an ardent protectionist, remarked in 
1876 that while the diminution in the production of broadcloths 
had “‘been attributed” to the effects of the tariff of 1846, and 
while it had also “‘been materially influenced by the constantly 
diminishing domestic supply of superfine wools,” ‘‘the principal 
cause of the decline” was the popular demand for other fabrics. 
The growing competition of these other fabrics, especially cassi- 
meres, has been noted with respect to the preceding period; but 
in these later decades, the movement became more pronounced. 
The chief competitor of broadcloth in the United States was still 
the cassimere; but now the form called “fancy cassimere,”’ of 
which the distinguishing characteristic was the range of possible 
patterns, came into prominence. This fabric made advantageous 
use of the medium-fine wools of the country. Moreover, being 
less difficult to produce than the broadcloth, and being turned 
out at lower unit cost, it could appeal to a larger market; and its 
production was especially facilitated by the invention of an im- 
proved loom. But particularly important was the fact that this 
new fabric took the popular fancy, commencing the trend toward 
extreme or extravagant designs. In brief, the American broad- 
cloth production was chiefly suffering from one of the evils to 
which the wool manufacture everywhere has been specially sub- 
ject, — the style influence. England was at this time undergoing 
a similar experience, when the use of ‘‘fancy goods... gave 


1 Hayes, Report on the Exhibition of 1876, p. 42. See also Kittredge, Dry Goods 
Economist, 1896, p. 82. 


306 THE MATURE FACTORY 


a heavy blow to the plain cloth trade,’ — that trade in which the 
West of England and the Leeds manufacturers had been prin- 
cipally engaged.' Broadcloth had long enjoyed an outstanding 
popularity, even a renown, while its name had come in the 
public mind to signify the finest and most desirable wool fabric. 
But the day of its supremacy had in 1830-1870 passed its noon 
and was declining steadily toward a long twilight. 


2. Rise of New Woolen Cloths. 


The counterpart of the decline in broadcloth production during 
the period between 1830 and 1870 is obviously in large measure 
the rise of manufacture in other lines. The development of such 
competitors, begun in the earlier period, made extraordinary 
strides in later years. There was this difference, however: that 
the earlier increase in diversification, noteworthy as it was, had 
not been so closely competitive as to depress seriously the broad- 
cloth production. Now the diversification led to direct rivalry, 
in which the broadcloth manufacture came off second best. 

The fancy cassimere, the principal competitor of the broad- 
cloth at this time and a cloth to be distinguished from the plain 
cassimere of former times, was a fabric of French origin. Credit 
for the new departure is attributed to M. Bonjean, a prominent 
wool manufacturer of Sedan, France, who, in 1834, conceived the 
idea of figured woolen goods in which the smooth surface of pre- 
vious cloths was sacrificed to the pattern effect. Introduction of 
the design into the goods was secured by the use of the Jacquard 
attachment joined to a hand loom. Inasmuch as the possible 
variety of fabric under these circumstances was as unlimited as 
fancy, — so the story goes, — he called the new goods “‘fancy”’ 
cassimeres. Foreign fashion seized on this new article with con- 
siderable avidity, it appears, and the manufacture of fancy cassi- 
meres spread in European countries; but several years passed be- 
fore this fabrication found place in the American production, — 
and then only under methods strikingly different from those used 
abroad. A gentleman returning from France in 1840 brought an 
overcoat in which the new fancy cloth was employed as lining. 

1 Baines, Yorkshire Past and Present, p. 666. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 307 


Mr. Samuel Lawrence, at that time agent of the Middlesex Mills 
of Lowell, saw the fabric, and was attracted to it. He obtained 
a sample from inside the coat collar, and set about the manu- 
facture of similar goods in the mills under his charge. It was not 
feasible to produce fancy cassimeres in the French manner, with 
the Jacquard attachment and hand labor, — that was obvious; 
and Mr. Lawrence made a notable contribution to the advance of 
the American wool manufacture when he brought about their 
fabrication by power weaving. 

The story of this adaptation is the story of the Crompton loom. 
Prior to the invention of this mechanism, all woolen looms ac- 
tuated by power had been cam looms, that is, looms in which the 
harnesses controlling the divisions of the warp had been moved by 
revolving cams.? Such machines put a fairly strict limitation on 
the number of harnesses that could be employed; and the change 
from weaving one pattern to weaving another occasioned a labo- 
rious rearrangement of cams. Both of these disadvantages were 
overcome by the Crompton loom. Its inventor, William Cromp- 
ton, an Englishman who had come to this country only in 1836, 
had developed his mechanism for use in the cotton manufacture, 
and indeed it was first used in the weaving of fancy cotton fabrics. 
In this new apparatus, “the figure or pattern to be produced 
could be made up on what is known as a chain. This chain is a 
series of bars, or lags, held together by links, so as to form a chain 


1 For accounts of this episode, see Report of the Judges at the Exhibition of 1876, 
Group IX, p. 43; Bulletin, 1877, pp. 109-110; and North, Bulletin, 1902, p. 316. 

However, it should be stated that the New England Mills of Rockville, Con- 
necticut, have contested with the Middlesex Mills, the honor of first introducing 
the manufacture of fancy cassimeres into the United States. Whichever deserves the 
honor of absolute priority, there can be no question that the Middlesex adventure 
was the one of much the greater significance for the American industry as a whole. 

2 The harnesses of a loom may be described as the frames through which the 
warp threads are drawn. The warp threads as they come from the loom beam, the 
large spool which is placed behind the loom, are divided in a preconceived manner, 
— according to the proposed weave structure of the finished cloth; and each division 
is drawn through a separate harness, and thence attached to the cloth beam in front 
of the loom. As the weaving proceeds, the harnesses are automatically moved up 
and down, raising or depressing given sections of the warp; and thus permitting 
varied interweavings of filling (or latitudinal) with warp (or longitudinal) yarns. 
(See Figure 3, p. 121, above.) 


308 THE MATURE FACTORY 


of bars, hence the name. On these bars or lags are rollers on pins, 
placed in such position that as the chain revolves it lifts, at cer- 
tain predetermined intervals, levers, which in turn cause the 
harnesses to be raised in such order that the desired design or 
pattern is produced upon the loom.” By this manner the control 
and operation of a much greater number of harnesses than here- 
tofore were made possible, — modern looms of this type employ 
as high as thirty harnesses, — while the transition from one 
pattern to another could be effected with ease, that is, merely by 
readjusting the lags and bars. Accordingly, the weaving of rather 
elaborate designs in cloth could be undertaken on power machines, 
and with at least no more trouble than the production of less 
complicated patterns on the cam loom. 

At Mr. Lawrence’s request, Crompton came to Lowell and pro- 
ceeded upon the adaptation of his fancy cotton loom to the weav- 
ing of woolen fabrics. Apparently this was accomplished without 
peculiar difficulty, and in 1840 production of fancy woolens by 
power began. This was a notable American achievement. As 
Mr. Hayes strikingly put it: ‘‘Not a yard of fancy woolen fabric 
had ever been woven by a power-loom in any country till done by 
Mr. William Crompton, at the Middlesex Mills in Lowell, in 
1840.” ? The effects of the invention were immediate. As for the 
Middlesex Company itself, within three years all the looms in the 
mill had been altered for use in the new system; and dividend 
rates which had averaged 11 per cent between 1839 and 1842 
jumped to 29 per cent in 1843.’ The significance of the innovation 

1 Lamb’s Textile Industries, p. 306. See also Crompton Loom Works, Catalogue 
of 1881, pp. 4-5; Hayes, American Textile Machinery, pp. 50-51; and Washburn, 
“Manufacturing and Mechanical Industries of Worcester,’ in History of Worcester 
County (Massachusetts), ii, 1612. 

2 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 50. 

This statement is something of an exaggeration. Woolen cloths that would 
come under the category of “fancy” goods have always and still are made upon 
cam looms. The difference between the cam and dobby looms is rather one of de- 
gree: a greater diversity of weaves is possibly on the latter. 

3 Report of the Company, 1857, p. 19. The dividend record gives rather a good 
picture of the immediate gain, the differential, secured by a concern through a 
temporarily exclusive advance in technique. It is as follows: 1839, 15 per cent; 
1840, 10; 1841, 10; 1842, 9; 1843, 29; 1844, 20; 1845, 14; and 1846, 13 per cent; 
but meanwhile the capital of the concern had been increased (through stock divi- 








THE ORIGINAL CROMPTON LOOM 
Devised by Mr. William Crompton in 1839-1840. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 309 


to the wool-manufacturing industry as a whole may be appre- 
ciated from the fact that within a generation at least three- 
quarters of all the woolen cloths then worn had come to be woven 
on fancy looms; and that the loom was soon introduced abroad 
and has been employed there in somewhat the same degree. 
Indeed, it was stated before the Congressional Committee on 
Patents in 1878 that ‘‘upon the Cromptom loom, or looms based 
upon it, is woven every yard of fancy cloth in the world.” ? 

With respect to American production of woolen cloth, the most 
immediate and striking result was upon the manufacture of fancy 
cassimeres. The proportion of sets devoted to cassimeres in New 
England and New York more than doubled between 1837 and 
1860: from less than 14 to over 31 per cent of the respective 
totals; and at the later date the term “‘cassimeres”’ signified the 
fancy type.* In Massachusetts alone, the yardage of such fabrics 
produced rose from a little under 2% million yards in 1845 to 
nearly 15% million in 1865, or, relative to total woolen-cloth 
production in the state, from a proportion of about a sixth to 
that of a third. In 1865, too, the proportion of cassimere in the 
total output of New York factories reached as high as 55 per 
cent. Meanwhile, not only the broadcloth but other manu- 
factures, notably satinet, were declining relatively in the eastern 
states; and cassimere became the outstanding feature of Ameri- 
can production in the chief manufacturing centers.’ 


dends, it seems) from $300,000 in 1839 to $600,000 in 1841, and to $750,000 in 1844. 
On the basis of the earlier capitalization, the subsequent dividends would have 
amounted to over 4o per cent per annum. 

1 Hayes, op. cit., p. 51. This does not mean that three-quarters of the woolen 
cloths woven are fancy goods. Plainer fabrics are wrought up on ‘“‘fancy”’ looms, 
either because the mills find it profitable so to use their equipment or because such 
looms make it possible to “‘ mix the fillings,” i. e., to use more than one shuttle in 
the weaving, and thus to reduce irregularities in the fabric arising from lack of 
uniformity in the weft yarns. 

1 bid. De 50. 

3 Benton and Barry, for the 1837 figures, p. 124; Hunt’s Merchants’ Magazine, 
xlii, 381, for those of 1860. 

4 The increased production of cassimeres at the Middlesex Company is illustra- 
tive: for 1836 and 18309, 328,000 yards are reported; for 1844, 468,000 yards; 1845, 
624,000 yards, and 1848, 1,000,000 yards (Handbook for the Visitor to Lowell, pp. 
44-45; Census of 1860, ‘iii, p. xxxii). 


310 THE MATURE FACTORY 


The condition of the wool supply was favorable to the produc- 
tion of cassimere; or perhaps better, the new cloths were adapted 
to the natural change which was taking place in the culture of 
native wools, — the shift from the growing of very fine to that of 
medium-fine staple. Of particular importance in this connection, 
too, was the change in the course of wool imports. The period 
after 1830 is marked by the rise of wool purchases from the Ar- 
gentine. ‘The course of these importations was irregular, even 
under a single tariff, but the quantities on the average were 
substantial. Indeed, one writer states that ‘‘the fancy cassimere 
manufacture may be said to have been developed by the use”’ of 
Argentinian wool.! The tariffs of 1832, 1842, and 1857 provided 
for specially low duties or free importation for wools valued below 
8, 7, and 20 cents, respectively. Under these provisions, it was 
advantageous to bring in the wools from the La Plata, wools of 
medium-fine staple but heavy condition (much extraneous ma- 
terial such as gravel, wool grease, and vegetable matter). More- 
over, not only were these wools loaded down with dirt, wool 
grease, and the like, but they contained a burr, picked up by the 
sheep from one of the native plants and tenaciously imbedded in 
the fleece, which made them less salable. To render such wools 
usable in the wool-cloth manufacture, it was necessary to remove 
these burrs. Early this was done by hand, laboriously; but . 
subsequently attempts were made both here and in France and 
England to accomplish the work by machinery. And at last came 
a really successful mechanism for eliminating the burrs, a mechan- 
ism of American origin. This was ‘‘a rapidly revolving guard or 
blade”? by which the burrs were struck from a card or toothed 
cylinder, — an invention of Mr. Michael H. Simpson of Boston 
in 1833 or 1834. It proved immediately popular in the American 
trade, and was widely adopted both here and abroad. Indeed, 
one indication of its real worth is the sale of the English rights to 
it for £10,000. Subsequently, not only were improvements 


1 North, Bulletin, 1895, p. 42. 

* Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 49. Subsequent improvements were 
made to the burr-picker, such as those by Parkhurst and Sargent, but Simpson’s 
invention is held by Hayes to have supplied the germ of the whole development 
(tbid., p. 49). 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 311 


made to this “burr picker” of Simpson’s,! but other devices look- 
ing toward the same end — the removal of vegetable matter from 
unwrought wool— were developed. Notable among the latter 


Wi} 

Hil 
ll 

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Fic. 8. Working Parts of the Burr Picker as built by Calvert & Sargent, Granite- 
ville, Massachusetts, under a patent of 1861. 

was the so-called burr cylinder which about 1846 began to be 

attached to the carding machines. Placed between the licker-in 

cylinders and the first working cylinder of the first or breaker 

1 Among such improvements may be mentioned those of Parkhurst and Sar- 

gent, and some incorporated in Belgian machines; but Simpson’s invention is held 


by Hayes to have supplied the germ of the whole development (American Textile 
Machinery, p. 49). 


312 THE MATURE FACTORY 


section of the woolen card, it served to kick out pieces of burrs 
that were adhering loosely to the wool fibers.! 

By virtue of such technical advances, South American wools 
were made more readily available for American manufacturers, 
while their importation was facilitated by tariff provisions. Our 
purchases from Argentine had averaged but 320,000 pounds in 
the five years 1830-1834. They rose to over 2 million pounds 
in the years 1835-1838, to nearly 9 million in 1841, and 12 million 
in 1849; and subsequently they were never less than 5% million.” 
To this should be added the increasing importations from South 
Africa, which under the tariff act of 1857 reached an annual total 
of over 2 million pounds.* The years just prior to 1860 were a 
period when our dependence upon foreign wool reached a point 
which has never since been equaled.* And in large proportion the 
increased purchases of foreign staple went into the development 
of cassimere and similar woolen-cloth production, for by their 
character they were well fitted for manufacture into such goods. 


1 Bulletin, 1902, p. 141. 
2 By tariff periods the average annual importation of raw wool from the 
Argentine was as follows: 


TE2QMKTS 32 opie vies beailig  c touk eb se) teh tp tite g oe ee 435,000 Ibs. 
1839=1842 | isl os Go siswhin Uhl unive Up tek le ceedten se alten: aan 2,623,000 “* 
18a3-t846. kb bs ew ee 7,169,000 “* 
847-0857 pick op ole ce la pone. ea, esc a ae 6,952,000 “* 
t858-2861. 03h bone woe poe ee ane Se 9,071,000 “ 


Moreover, if one divides the long period under the tariff of 1846 into two periods, 
1847-1851 and 1852-1857, he finds that importations during the former years 
averaged approximately 8,000,000 pounds per annum, and in the later years some- 
what over 6,000,000 pounds. These facts suggest that here the effects of the tariff 
of 1846 in imposing equal rates upon wool and wool manufactures were negligi- 
ble. Not only did the course of importation hold up well as compared with the 
preceding years under the supposedly more lenient tariff of 1842 (wools valued at 
seven cents per pound and less were admitted free of duty), but for several years 
averaged an absolutely larger volume. Apparently the lines of manufacture em- 
ploying this variety of wool particularly were able to bear up fairly well under the 
peculiar conditions imposed by the common rate upon raw material and finished 
product. 

3 The only figures available in this relation are for the whole of Africa; but little 
seems to have come elsewhere than from the Cape. This wool like the Argentinian 
has always been heavy wool, but apparently it was of too high a price to be affected 
by the seven and eight-cent minima of the 1832 and 1842 tariffs. 

4 Wright, pp. 154-155. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 313 


The advance in production along these lines was further stim- 
ulated by inventions in looms which marked progress rivaling 
that of the original Crompton contribution. The latter was a 
narrow loom, only about forty inches wide, was limited in its 
speed to forty-five picks per minute, and contained provision 
for but a single shuttle.’ Soon afterwards, shuttle boxes were 
added, first upon one and then upon both sides. Thereafter it 
was possible to “‘mix the fillings” and to use more than one color 
of weft yarn, the latter increasing yet further the opportunities 
for varying the pattern. Of equal importance, if not greater, was 
the evolution of the Crompton broad fancy loom. This mechan- 
ism, developed in 1857, was not merely a broadening of the earlier 
loom to permit the weaving of fifty-four-inch goods. The opera- 
tion of twenty-four harnesses and of three boxes in either end was 
also permitted; and, of yet greater significance, the speed of this 
loom was markedly increased. Even with the narrow loom, the 
speed hitherto attained had not been in excess of fifty-five picks 
per minute. This was now raised to eighty-five picks. Thus both 
by the greater width of machine and by the enhanced speed of 
operation, production was much increased.” This loom, it may be 
added, had by 1870 been further improved, not only by virtue 
of better workmanship but also by the addition of devices 
through which the machine was rendered more automatic and 
therefore capable of greater production though operated by less 
skilled workmen. Some twenty years later, or more specifically 


1 North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 338; Lamb’s Textile Industries, p. 304; Worcester 
Columbian Tribute, 1893, p. 77. In Lamb, the width of these early looms is given 
as forty-eight inches. 

A “pick” is a single transmission of the shuttle across the loom. 

2 The conversion of all weaving machinery in the country to looms of this in- 
creased speed, of course, was not immediate. Looms generally possess a long life. 
Nor apparently were the benefits of the new machine extended at once to all 
branches of the industry. The weaving of flannels, for example, proceeded at the 
speed of forty-four picks per minute in the Talbot Mills, of North Billerica, Massa- 
chusetts, — a factory built in 1857, — until 1862, when the speed was increased to 
fifty-six picks (Textile Manufacturers’ Journal, March 21, 1903, p. 9). This may 
have been due, however, to the unusual width to which flannels were fabricated, 
three yards, for which width Hayes reports a speed for flannels of forty-eight to 
fifty picks in 1860. By 1879 this speed had been quickened to seventy or seventy- 
five picks (Bulletin, 1879, p. 280). 


314 THE MATURE FACTORY 


in 1893, it was claimed that fully 75 per cent of the fancy 
woolen and worsted weaving was being done on looms of this 
variety.! 

Under the stimulus afforded by changing and broadening pub- 
lic demand, and facilitated by the peculiarly important technical 
development just outlined, the woolen manufacture continually 
took on new lines of production.? Special varieties of cassimere 
arose, such as Harris’s famous double and twist cassimere, — a 
fancy type of cassimere developed by an enterprising Rhode Is- 
land manufacturer. Toward the close of the forties, Scotch plaids 
and tweeds were being fabricated in American mills by power, 
while the hand loom still prevailed in Scotch homes and small 
establishments. By the sixties a rich diversity of fabrics was 
flowing from our woolen factories: not only the broadcloth, cassi- 
mere, satinet, and flannel of earlier production, but cheviots, 
woven shawls, plainer cloths such as castors and beavers, and 
less important special goods. By the seventies, some mills were 
said to make not less than fifty distinct classes.of fabrics; while 
a large specialized mill, such as a large cassimere factory, would 
produce as many as two hundred different designs each season, 
or four hundred a year. —The manufacturing industry by 1870 
had taken on quite a modern complexion. 

In quality, this new production was of as much significance as 
in the matter of type of cloth. The decline in broadcloth manu- 
facture might seem to forecast a lowering in the average fineness 
of the domestic output, but in reality this was not a decisive 


1 Catalogue of the Crompton Loom Company, 1881, pp. 5-6; Worcester Columbian 
Tribute, pp. 77-78; North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 282; and Dry Goods Economist, 1896, 
p. 44. Hayes wrote in 1876 that he had been assured by his associates from Sweden, 
Austria, and Germany, in the group of judges on wool and woolens at the Centen- 
nial Exhibition of 1876, that the specific Crompton loom, with its recent improve- 
ments, was in use in all the principal establishments on the continent of Europe 
(Bulletin, 1879, p. 46), though probably this assertion must contain a consider- 
able measure of exaggeration. 

2 For other improvements in loom construction, see below, pp. 363-364. 

3 Hayes, Awards and Claims, p. 450. The extent to which some specialties were 
produced is illustrated by the experience of the Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company. 
Between 1860 and 1868, the concern was running upon Balmoral material for skirts, 
“not only devoting all their machinery to this product, but filling neighboring 
buildings with hand-looms for the same purpose”’ (ibid., p. 88). 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 315 


factor, and one must also consider that some of the fancy cassi- 
meres or doeskins were in fact cloths of very good grade; that the 
new goods as a whole were largely superior in quality to the sat- 
inets or negro-cloths which had been developed in the period 
before 1830. In general, the tendency was distinctly toward the 
production of a very fair average grade of cloth, — not the fine 
quality of some importations, but not a distinctly low quality of 
output, — and an average at least as high as the output of pre- 
ceding decades. 

Toward the close of the period under discussion, however, came 
the appearance of a new feature with respect to quality, — the 
considerable utilization of shoddy or recovered wool fiber. The 
first mill in the United States to use this substance — fiber re- 
covered by the rending of rags, cloth remnants, wool knit-goods, 
and the like — seems to have been one located in Quechee, Ver- 
mont. This mill is said to have started using shoddy as early as 
_ 1836.1 Another establishment for the use of shoddy was pro- 
jected in 1842, also in Vermont, although there is no evidence as 
to what became of the scheme.? At any event, the practice of 
utilizing recovered wool fiber grew apace, and by 1860 concerns 
for the production of shoddy were reported to number thirty and 
to contain two hundred and ninety employees. Yet on the whole 
the expansion through this last date was not significant. The 
great increase in use occurred during the Civil War. The rise in 
price of raw wool and the short life of military clothing induced 
the government to permit large employment of this new material; 
and thereafter utilization in the industry became more general 
and widespread. The end of the decade found the shoddy-making 
industry doubled in size, and this recovered fiber forming 15 to 
20 per cent of the wool stock employed in the woolen-cloth 
manufacture.® 


1 Letter to the author. 

2 Hazard’s United States Commercial and Statistical Register, vi, 189. 

3 Other references to the development of the shoddy manufacture and use: 
Art and Industry ai the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 212; Census of 1860, iil, p. XXXV; 
Kettell, Highty Years’ Progress, p. 313. 

The proportion of shoddy used in 1870 to the total weight of new and recovered 
wool fiber is an estimate. It is based on (x) the statistics of shoddy bought by 
woolen mills in that year, and (2) the scoured equivalent of the raw wool bought, 


316 THE MATURE FACTORY 


The more considerable utilization of recovered wool fiber came 
too late in the period with which we are now concerned to have 
appreciable effect upon its course. It was rather a prelude to 
events in the following decades. Neither before nor after 1870, 
to be sure, did the use of shoddy have any noticeable effect upon 
the types of wool fabric produced in the American manufacture; 
but by 1870 the employment of this material was beginning to 
influence the general quality of output in the woolen branch of 
the industry. 

3. Other Woolen Fabrics. 


The vicissitudes in the manufacture of other woolen fabrics are 
partly a reflection of the development in that of cassimeres and 
similar cloths, and partly an independent history. The manu- 
facture of satinets, for example, shared the disfavor which fell 
upon the broadcloth production, though for somewhat different 
reasons and in less degree; whereas the blanket section of the 
industry experienced a considerable and fairly steady growth. 
Again, in some instances, as in that of flannels, the phenomenon 
spoken of above of increasing diversification in production is 
manifest. An investigation of the experience in each of these im- 
portant cases is, then, a matter of special interest. 

The increasing strength of the flannel manufacture in the period 
prior to 1830 has been described earlier. The conditions imposed 
by the tariff of 1828 were perhaps a significant influence in pre- 
senting the domestic producer with virtual command of the 
American market. But the steady decrease in flannel importa- 
tions before the enactment of that law suggests that this was not 
the dominant factor, as does also the lack of any reaction toward 
higher imports when lower tariff rates subsequently came into 
effect... In fact, such importations became of ever-decreasing 
importance, as they tended actually to diminish while domestic 
secured under the assumption that the ratio of raw to scoured wool was the same 
in 1870 as appeared in the Census figures of 1880. 

It will be noted further that only the woolen branch of the industry is concerned. 
The worsted branch neither then nor now has used shoddy, except for the produc- 
tion of a few woolen yarns. Fiber as short as shoddy cannot be used in combing. 


1 Importations increased in the prosperous era of the early thirties until they 
reached a height of 635,000 square yards in 1836. Thereafter they decreased to a 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 317 


production rose in volume. Indeed, it may be asserted confi- 
dently that after 1830 the American fabric was with minor 
exceptions able to monopolize the domestic market. Such im- 
portations as did come in were chiefly the finest qualities, es- 
pecially the so-called opera flannel, in which the style influence 
entered.! 

The success of the flannel manufacture is attributed by some 
observers to the ‘“‘peculiar adaptation of American wools to this 
fabric;” ? and, to be sure, this factor played an important part. 
A fine wool was not required and a truly coarse wool was not 
suitable. The semi-fine to medium-grade wool of our domestic 
culture with its good staple satisfied peculiarly well the needs of 

the flannel makers. But equally important, if not more im- 
portant, was the simplicity of flannel manufacture. All woolen 
cloth is at one time a flannel, i. e., when it first comes from the 
loom. Moreover, for the most part, at least in the period under 
discussion, flannel did not suffer from the effect of style and 
changing fashion. Flannel shirts, underwear, and petticoats ab- 
sorbed huge weights of the article. A mill needed to prepare few 
samples, only those necessary to show the particular shades of 
the current season, and having secured its orders it could run 
month after month upon a very limited line of goods. Indeed, 
low point of 117,000 square yards per annum in the five years 1842-1846, following 
which they grew gradually until by 1855-1857 they averaged 361,000 yards. Special 
demands of the Civil War period brought temporarily higher quantities. 

1 Hayes, Bulletin, 1877, p. 118. 

In the statistics of machinery or of production, those referring to flannels are 
mixed with those pertaining to blankets in the later years. Still, a marked increase 
in the flannel manufacture is apparent, especially when it is recognized, as stated 
below, that the blanket section of the industry was in a much less satisfactory con- 
dition than the flannel section. Benton and Barry reported in 1837 the devotion 
of 158 sets to flannels and 24 sets to blankets, hats, and yarn, for the whole country. 
In 1860 New England and New York contained 369 sets devoted to flannels and 
blankets together. In Massachusetts alone, the production of flannels and blankets 
rose between 1845 and 1865 from 4,491,000 yards to 20,038,000 yards. 

2 Ibid. See also, Bulletin, 1874, p. 78; and Joint Report to the United States 
Revenue, Commission, 1866, p. 14: “In a class of fabrics, entering perhaps more 
largely than any other into general consumption — that of flannels — the superior- 
ity due principally to the admirable adaptation of the common wools of this country, 


their strength and spinning qualities, is so marked as almost wholly to exclude 
foreign flannels.” 


318 THE MATURE FACTORY 


there were concerns which ran year after year with no substantial 
changes in weight, construction, or quality of their output. Fi- 
nally, being a fabric of wide and steady consumption, it relieved 
manufacturers of much risk that attended, say, broadcloth or 
cassimere production. 

This plain variety of flannel formed an essential part of the 
output from the increasing number of western mills that grew up 
during these years. It also continued to be the most important 
part of flannel production in the eastern states; but here new 
types began to make their appearance. About 1835 manufacture 
of the so-called ‘‘domett”’ flannel was started. This fabric, 
claimed by some to be of American origin, was composed of a 
cotton warp and woolen filling. Its earlier employment was as a 
substitute for the linsey-woolsey then largely worn by working- 
women for petticoats. Later it found other uses in infants’ wear, 
shirting, and the like; and it continued to be a sensible part of 
American flannel manufacture.! Then came other varieties: fine 
white flannel, plaid flannel, printed flannel, opera flannel, and 
finally a flannel coating for men’s summer wear.” Obviously here 
was increased diversification of product, and, curiously enough, a 
diversification in the line of higher quality of fabric. The opera 
flannel, for example, is described as “‘more highly gigged and 
finished than the ordinary article, being piece-dyed uniformily, 
and of many fancy colors, and hot pressed.” ? The production of 
the fine white flannel at Ballardvale involved double spinning, 
that is, a repetition of spinning upon a single yarn, in order to 

1 Report of Judges at Exhibition of 1876, Group IX; p. 50; Bulletin, 1879, p. 211. 
As to origin of the fabric, see mention of the name by a British manufacturer in 
testimony in 1828 (Bischoff, Woolen and Worsted Manufactures, ii, 178). In more 
recent decades, it may be added, domett flannel has become an all-cotton fabric. 

2 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 82; Bulletin, 1902, p. 136; Bulletin, 
1877, pp. 120, 122, 119. The first production of fine white flannel is attributed to 
the Ballardvale Mills in 1836; opera flannels to the Bay State Mills, apparently in 
the early fifties; and flannel coating to the Middlesex or Washington Mills, both of 
which claim the honor, about 1859. 

Besides the increase in the variety of flannel fabric, there was also an increase 
in the diversity of its use. Among other employments, there were mentioned in the 
seventies: under-garments, linings for overcoats, blouses for workmen, fatigue uni- 


forms for soldiers and police, and coats for summer wear (Bulletin, 1877, p. 119). 
3 Hayes, Bulletin, 1877, p. 119. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 319 


secure the fine threads for warp and filling; while the printed 
flannel was undertaken at a time when it was necessary for the 
fancier varieties to employ hand block-printing.1 In short, the 
flannel manufacture was already beginning to show that token 
of maturity, the acquisition of finer qualities in production, which 
the woolen industry as a whole was not to display until some 
decades later. This feature together with control of the American 
market is significant in suggesting the relative strength of the 
flannel manufacture generally. This branch of the wool-manu- 
facturing industry enjoyed no special advantages, tariff or other, 
over the rest of that industry, except such as were derived from 
the particular character of flannel making. The situation, then, 
gives emphasis to the benefit to be derived from large-scale or 
steady production of such simple, standard goods as were the 
greater share of the flannels then turned out. Of course, in so 
far as production tended toward higher qualities, it lost some- 
thing of the total possible advantage? 

Blankets share with ordinary flannels the relative freedom from 
changes in fashion; and yet in the period before 1830 their pro- 
duction had been far from sufficient for the domestic market. 
Now one notable obstacle to their domestic manufacture, lack of 
adequate cheap wool supplies, was eliminated by the increased 
importations under the tariffs which permitted the introduction 
of low-priced wools under special rates. The grade of wool util- 
ized in blankets at this time continued to be of the inferior quality 
employed in the earlier decades, wools for blankets and for carpets 
being frequently mentioned in the same breath.* For the whole 
period 1832 to 1846, such low staples were available to American 
blanket manufacturers, and to this fact is attributable, in part, 

1 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 82; Wallis, Report, British Docu- 
ments, 1854 [1717], p.-17. It was said in 1853 that the flannels exhibited by the 
Ballardvale Company were ‘‘ unequaled for fineness of texture, and for whiteness, 
by the best Welch flannels,” which were long the superlative in the flannel trade 
(Art and Industry at the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 215). 

2 There are notes of occasional exportation of flannels in the seventies, both to 
Canada and to South America (Bulletin, 1877, pp. 118, 119). 

3 Randall, Sheep Husbandry, p. 87; DeBow’s Review, 1854, xvi, 468; Bond, 


“Development of Wool Manufactures in the United States,” in Wool and Manufac- 
tures of Wool, 1887, p. lviii. 


320 THE MATURE FACTORY 


the increase in blanket production in this country. Of at least 
equal importance were two other factors. On the technical side 
one should note the more general use of power looms in the manu- 
facture, as well as the use of those other mechanical improvements 
common to the whole wool-manufacturing industry, — improved 
carding, finishing, and the like. And,secondly, one must take into 
account the westward movement of the industry, — since blan- 
kets formed one of the chief elements in the output of the western 
mills and since the production there was less sensitive to some of 
the adverse factors which affected eastern mills.1 

In fact, the peaceful development of the blanket manufacture 
was shortly to be harassed by unfavorable conditions, especially 
as far as the larger eastern mills were concerned. Particularly 
unfortunate was the experience of this manufacture after 1846. 
The production did not perhaps “‘find a grave” in the tariff of 
that year,” but seemingly it was appreciably distressed. That 
tariff act imposed a duty of only 20 per cent upon blankets, 
while the wool from which blankets were made bore a rate of 
30 per cent. Assuming the price of wool in this country to have 
been raised by the full amount of the duty, scant net protection 
remained for the blanket manufacture. Apparently as a result of 
this situation, imports rose in value from approximately $700,000 
per year under the tariff of 1828 to twice that figure in the early 
fifties; and such figures do not give the whole story, since the 
value per unit of quantity had fallen. Thus, importations of 
blankets from the United Kingdom alone rose from slightly over 
a million yards around 1830 to 4% million yards in the middle 
fifties, as the unit value fell from ts. 8d. to 1s. 2d. per yard. Yet 
not all was lost. Despite these enhanced importations, the in- 
dustry seems to have sustained itself in fair shape, though per- 
haps it did not expand in the degree which one would otherwise 
have expected. On the other hand, as regards quality, the years 

1 The precise increase in volume of blanket manufacture it is impossible to ascer- 
tain. The blanket is usually combined with the flannel production, — and statistics 
of the combined output have been presented. The frequency with which blankets 
appear in the reports of mill production in Graham’s enumeration of 1845 suggests 


the widespread manufacture of this fabric. 
2 Cowley, History of Lowell, 1868, p. 58. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 321 


between 1846 and the Civil War seem to have witnessed a rise 
in the character of blanket demanded by the domestic market; 
and the domestic production kept pace with this change in qual- 
ity. Improved apparatus and new methods were introduced, 
until by reason of “‘the excellence of our fabrics’? — the result of 
“the skill previously acquired and the admirable raw material 
furnished by our domestic wool’? — domestic manufacturers were 
said to supply in the period just before the Civil War ‘‘nearly all 
the grades of blankets which went into American consumption, 
except those of the lowest sort.” ! 

Nor did the improvement in quality cease with 1860. In fact, 
that movement was probably accelerated in the subsequent dec- 
ade. By the early seventies, the wool going into the fabrication 
of blankets is no longer spoken of as cheap, foreign wool, but 
American medium or grade (i. e., part-blood) merino wools. The 
latter, it was said at that time, composed the material for the 
great majority of our blankets.?, Most of the production was of 
medium quality ‘‘for the consumption of the millions;”’ but there 
was already a beginning of manufacture in the fine grades.? The 
blanket section of the industry, then, had begun to feel much the 
same influences and to have in some degree the same experience 
as had the flannel branch somewhat earlier with its specially fine 
flannels, its flannel coatings, and the like. 

Now let us turn to other fabrics; and here we have largely the 
reverse of the picture already given of expansion in the production 
of cassimeres and flannels: namely, the decline in the manufac- 
ture of such goods as satinets, linseys, and negro-cloths. To some 
extent this was an absolute decline, as far as figures upon the 
industry give evidence. The number of sets within New England 
and New York, which in 1837 were engaged upon satinets, had 

1 Bulletin, 1881, p. 383; an article with protectionist leanings. 

Somewhat later there were references to the exportation of blankets. Some pro- 
duced in Minneapolis were said to have been sent to England ‘“‘to furnish the new 
lines of palace sleeping-cars” (Bulletin, 1874, p. 78), and horse blankets were also 
being shipped to England (Bulletin, 1879, p. 282). These may well be exceptional 
cases, although blankets have always played a considerable part in our small, 
almost negligible export trade in wool fabrics. | 


2 Bulletin, 1877, p. 121; tbid., 1874, p. 78. 
8 Bulletin, 1881, p. 383; ibid., 1879, p. 282. 


322 THE MATURE FACTORY 


been 465; by 1860, it had decreased to 374. In the case of linseys 
and such coarse cloths, the decrease had been from 144 to 95 sets. 
But relative to all other production, the decline had been even 
greater. For example, the sets employed on satinets had equaled 
37 per cent of the total machinery reported for New England and 
New York in 1837; whereas in 1860 they amounted only to 
17 per cent. The rise of cassimeres in the forties had, indeed, 
‘almost entirely superseded the use of satinets for the best 
trade;”’ 1 and in later years the production of satinets was further 
knocked about by the competition in the lower qualities of its 
output.” 

The decline, to be sure, was not immediate after 1830. Indeed, 
the manufacture of satinets, linseys, and such cloths seems to 
have benefited as did that of blankets from the relatively low 
duties on the cheaper types of raw wool during the period of 1832 
to 1846. The Hazards of Peacedale, Rhode Island, had com- 
menced the manufacture of negro-cloths in 1830, and they con- 
tinued that line of production for many years thereafter.’ In 1845 
satinets and Kentucky jeans had formed nearly 40 per cent of 
the Massachusetts woolen production. Even in the succeeding 
decade, though a decline had occurred in the relative position of 
such fabrics, — that is, as compared with other products of 
Massachusetts mills, — the actual amount of output materially 
increased.* At the same time, production of linseys and negro- 
cloths was particularly noteworthy around Baltimore and Phila- 
delphia. Most of these goods went south, but considerable 
quantities were said to be sold in the West, as far as the Missouri 
River and the Rocky Mountains, “‘being used there for the cloth- 


1 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 20. 

2 In its last estate, satinet became a markedly low-grade article, composed of 
cotton warp and shoddy filling. But even with the lower price made possible by 
such contriving, it could not compete successfully with other fabrics. 

3 Clark, p. 433. 

4 The production figures for Massachusetts for 1845, 1855, and 1865 areas follows 
for these goods, in thousands of yards: 


1845 1855 1865 
Satinetsi.-0 cues ae alee yeoman 3559 6736 6472 
Kentuckyjjeans a ewicee eee 1652 1949 629 


Totalotalitabrics: wlan ene 13,877 26,169 46,009 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 323 


ing of labourers and backwoodsmen.”? Subsequently, or from 
the early fifties on, despite improvement in the manufacture of 
satinets,” the production of all such coarser fabrics seems to have 
decreased steadily in the eastern states. In the western mills, 
the manufacture of linseys and satinets continued longer, 
especially in the case of small mills which exchanged their 
products with the neighboring farmers, but apparently by 
1870 this western manufacture of such goods was surely on the 
decline. 

The decrease in the production of satinets, linseys, and the like 
is especially notable because it fits in with the tendency toward a 
rising quality among woolen products. The diminution of the 
broadcloth production was, of course, an element acting in the 
other direction; but for the rest of the trade, and within most 
individual sections of the industry, there appears to have been a 
pronounced movement in the way of improved quality. The 
coarser fabrics, suitable to frontier conditions, were becoming less 
and less salable, and in their place came the fancy cassimeres, 
doeskins, fine flannels, and similar goods. The country was grow- 
ing richer, the market broader, and the demand more insistent 
for semi-fine cloths. Beyond the production of this medium-fine 
quality, the domestic manufacture generally did not go—and by 
modern standards this quality of fabric might be classified rather 
as distinctly medium grade. The demand for the finest goods was 
still supplied by importation, — at least, until the newer condi- 
tions imposed as a result of the Civil War and the higher tariff 
policies made possible a renewed movement toward fine woolen 
manufacture in this country.? Production in the period before 
1870, then, began at a relatively low quality, with satinets, lin- 
seys, negro-cloths, etc., in special prominence, but the trend dur- 


1 Wallis, Report, British Documents, 1854 [1717], p. 18; Freedley, Philadelphia 
and its Manufactures in 1857, p. 238. 

2 In 1853 it was remarked with regard to satinets: ‘‘In contrast with articles of 
this class made in America twenty years ago, they exhibit a true picture of the rapid 
growth of manufacturing art in this country. The productions of former years were 
rough, stiff, and coarse, while these are perfectly smooth and pliable. The former 
harshness of face is entirely removed and they now nearly resemble the French 
cassimeres” (Art and Industry at the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 233). 

3 See below, vol. II, pp. 174 ff. 


324 THE MATURE FACTORY 


ing the decades was unquestionably toward a production steadily 
rising in quality. 


4. Worsted Fabrics. 


The most extraordinary feature of fabric development in the 
period now under consideration, more distinctive than the rise 
of the fancy cassimere production, — which did have substantial 
roots in the past, — was the introduction of worsted-cloth manu- 
facture. The colonial period, it is true, had seen a small produc- 
tion of worsted fabrics, but it was upon a handicraft basis and 
limited to a few cloths specially suited to the finer trade. The 
decades following 1760, while yielding a momentous expansion 
and consolidation of the woolen branch, witnessed a practical 
disappearance of the worsted manufacture. Few, indeed, are the 
references to be found concerning it in the succeeding three- 
quarters of acentury.t It may seem strange at first thought that 
such should have been the case. These decades formed a period 
of marked growth in the British worsted industry. The methods 
of the worsted manufacture are not dissimilar to those of the 
cotton manufacture, more akin than are those of the woolen in- 
dustry; and these years were notable for the increase of the cotton 
manufacture in the United States. The typical worsted fabrics 
of the time, light dress-goods, would have filled a conspicuous gap 
in domestic output of woolen cloths, since the woolen goods were 
more suitable for men’s than for women’s wear. In brief, many 
factors seemed to favor a growth in the worsted-cloth production. 

However, the early worsted manufacture in fact could be 
operated only under severe handicaps, — handicaps which appar- 
ently more than counterbalanced the propitious factors. Three 
important obstacles may be noted. The supply from domestic 
sources of long combing wool — that derived from the sheep of 
English breed — was not great; the American workmen or fore- 
men skilled in the methods of production were few indeed; and 


1 Field (State of Rhode Island, iii, 363) reports the formation in 1820 of the Paw- 
tucket Worsted Company for the manufacture of fine vestings, ‘‘the first specimen 
of worsted goods of American make.” See also Niles, xxxiii, 211; Bishop, ii, 361; 
Clark, p. 573. ; 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 325 


the processes were as yet not wholly adapted to power machinery. 
The last was probably the decisive factor, and will bear some 
special examination. What machinery was employed in the first 
decades for the spinning process is uncertain, probably the quasi- 
automatic woolen or the cotton mule, and weaving proceeded on 
power looms; but for the distinctive worsted process, the wool 
combing, hand labor was still necessary. In 1835 Mr. Michael H. 
Simpson of Boston had brought into use a wool-combing machine 
invented by Samuel Couillard, a Frenchman; but apparently it 
did not give full satisfaction, and seems to have found employ- 
ment only in the manufacture of worsted carpet warps. In the 
worsted-cloth mills, hand-combing prevailed generally as late as 
1860.1 Under the circumstances it is rather remarkable that 
there should have been any considerable development of a 
worsted industry before the Civil War. 

The original worsted production in this country on a factory 
basis, barring one or two negligible attempts at fancy worsted 
vestings, was worsted yarns. The Dedham Worsted Company, 
of Dedham, Massachusetts, incorporated in 1821, produced ‘‘a 
very superior kind of fine worsted yarns, suitable for coach lace, 
hosiery, and fringe makers.”’? As late as 1845 the chief worsted 
product of the New England Worsted Company was worsted 
yarn, — 350,000 pounds, as compared with 3000 pieces of bunt- 
ing.2 The Lowell Manufacturing Company in 1831 set up ma- 


1 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 54; North, Bulletin, 1902, p. 331; 
Hayes, Bulletin, 1879, p. 280; Clark, p. 424. The Simpson machine is said to have 
been improved in 1854, and in the seventies to be ‘“‘in universal use in this country 
for preparing the wool for carpet worsteds”’ and to be “‘indispensable in this manu- 
facture” (Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 54). 

Apparently combing machines began to be introduced from England in the 
earlier part of the sixties. Infact,Samuel Yewdall of West Philadelphia is reported 
to have established the first power-combing mill in that region, using Lister combs, 
in 1860 (Annual Report of the Pennsylvania Secretary of Internal A ffairs, 1888, Offi- 
cial Document No. 14, p. 1 D). 

2 Kayser, Commercial Directory, p. 110. 

3 Fleischmann, p. 42. Mr. George Bond in 1837, opposing a lower duty or free 
entry of worsted yarn, stated: “The Committee no doubt included this article 
from the impression that it is not made in this country to any considerable extent. 
Now, the fact is, that there have been, for some years, small establishments 
in operation, which, in the aggregate, have produced a good deal for different 


326 THE MATURE FACTORY 


chinery for the production of worsted warp yarns.! The industry, 
then, was as yet a subsidiary affair, supplying semi-manufactured 
goods to the woolen, carpet,and other manufactures. While there 
was a small production of worsted fabrics, or fabrics in which 
worsted yarns were considered the important feature, the real 
expansion of the industry did not occur until the introduction of 
mousseline-de-laines. 

Mousseline-de-laine, as the name implies, was first developed 
as an imitation in wool of the cotton muslin. It originated in 
France as an all-wool fabric, made of fine, soft staple; but later it 
was produced in England with a cotton warp and inferior wool 
filling. The weave employed brought the wool yarns to the sur- 
face, making it superficially a wool fabric. It was finished in 
plain colors, or more frequently printed, just as muslins are 
printed. Its cheapness, durability, and sightliness, according to 
Hayes, made its introduction “‘an invaluable boon to women of 
moderate means.” ? For twenty years this fabric, together with 
cloths derived from and allied with it, dominated the women’s- 
wear section of the wool manufacture.® 

The first mention of mousseline-de-laine production in the 


purposes” (24th Cong., 2nd Sess., Senate Documents, No. 173, p. 4). 

The Massachusetts Census of 1845 reported ten establishments engaged in the 
manufacture of worsted goods or goods of which worsted was a component part. 
They produced 617,000 pounds of worsted yarn and 2,321,000 yards of goods, in- 
cluding seemingly those in which worsted yarn was “‘a component part.” 

1 Clark, p. 573. 

2 Bulletin, 1870, p. 257. 

The importance of the cotton warp for wool fabrics 1 is well stated by Hayes in 
this connection: “‘No event of the century has done more for female comfort and 
for the industry of wool than the introduction of the cotton warp. Cotton, instead 
of being the rival, became the most important auxiliary of wool, and has added 
vastly to its consumption.” The utility of the cotton warp in relation to the satinet 
manufacture has already been noted; and later the importance of cotton-warp 
dress-goods generally will appear. 

3 The production of this fabric has not wholly died out even yet. For example, the 
Hamilton Woolen Company, which early made delaines, continued the manufacture 
‘in practically the same construction, as ‘Danish cloth’ and later as ‘ Danish Poplar 
cloth’ ” (Brief Record of the Company, p. 3). This Danish cloth may still be pur- 
chased at the dry-goods counter of any large department store, to which the in- 
terested reader should apply if he wishes to secure an idea of this early worsted 
fabric. Danish cloth is now chiefly sold for bathing suits, costumes, and the like. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 327 


United States relates to 1840 when a Providence concern is said 
to have made up such goods in imitation of a piece imported from 
France.1 The real commencement of this manufacture, however, 
seems to have come only when in 1845 the Ballardvale Mills and 
Hamilton Woolen Company took up the production, and when 
in 1853 the Pacific Mills were built with the avowed purpose of 
this manufacture.” The Amoskeag Manufacturing Company 
took on production of the article shortly thereafter; and the 
Massachusetts Census of 1855 reported three out of seven worsted 
establishments to be engaged exclusively on this fabric, one of 
them printing as much as 4% million yards annually. The first 
delaines (as the article came to be known) produced by the Amos- 
keag Company were said to average seven yards to the pound, 
though subsequently lighter-weight fabrics of similar character 
were produced.? Moreover, new variations of delaines soon ap- 
peared, apparently following upon developments in England: 
reps, coburgs, and the like; until a very substantial group of 
worsted fabrics — and a group which formed a large part of 
later worsted dress-goods production — was available for do- 
mestic consumption.* 

The difficulties in turning out the worsted filling yarn were at 
first so great — wool-combing being of course the chief obstacle 
— that some mills sought escape by circumvention, i. e., by sub- 
stituting woolen for worsted yarns. This was not infrequently 
done, and yet the fabric was still called “delaine.”’ Thus the 
Manchester and Pacific Mills both resorted in their first produc- 
tion of this article to the use of woolen filling. But soon the 
requirement of worsted yarns became fixed; and the difficulties 
had to be met more directly. The Manchester, Ballardvale, and 


1 Bishop, ii, 420, note. 

2 Hayes, Bulletin, 1877, pp. 134-135; Bagnall, pp. 575-576; Hamilton Woolen 
Company, Brief Record of the Company, p. 2; The Arlington Mills, 1891, pp. 94-99; 
Hayes, Report on the Exhibition of 1876, pp. 61-62; Ammidown’s Historical Collec- 
tions, ll, 375-378. 

3 Wallis, Report, British Documents, 1854 [1717], p. 22. 

4 It was stated in 1867 that “in consequence of the domestic manufacture 
of this fabric (delaines), the importation of printed delaines has almost 
wholly ceased”? (Hayes and Mudge, Report on the Paris Exposition of 1867, vi, 


25). 


328 THE MATURE FACTORY 


other mills seemingly resorted to hand-combing for some years; ? 
and then gradually machines were introduced. All types of these 
machines were of British origin, and many specimens of such ap- 
paratus were directly imported from England. The Pacific Mills 
brought in six Lister machines soon after they commenced the 
manufacture of delaines. Some ‘‘inferior combers of American 
invention” were employed for a time at the Manchester Mills, 
ultimately being replaced by Noble combs. In 1860 power-driven 
combs were in operation at Samuel Yewdall’s mill in West 
Philadelphia; and in two or three years’ time John and Wil- 
liam Yewdall had introduced the Noble machine at their 
new Fairmount Mills, Philadelphia. At about the same 
period a Lister comb was also set up by the Abbot Worsted 
Company, Graniteville, Massachusetts.? Before 1870 the whole 
worsted manufacture had adopted power combing, employ- 
ing these machines of English origin, especially the. Noble 
comb.? 

As for other machinery peculiar to worsted-yarn production, 
improvement also came in time, and by the same road, —borrow- 
ing from England. The British industry had gone through a long 
experience of trial and experimentation, from the time when, in- 
the latter years of the eighteenth century, Crompton’s mule was 
first adapted to worsted spinning.* The first forward step had 

1 The Ballardvale Mills turned out worsted delaines throughout the period 
1844-1850, although they apparently had no combing machines. 

2 The Arlington Mills, p. 96; Hayes, Bulletin, 1877, p. 135; Annual Report of the 
Pennsylvania Secretary of Internal Affairs, 1888, Official Document No. 14, p. 1 D; 
North, Bulletin, 1902, p. 331. 

The Lister and Noble combs are the most important machines of this character, 
both the inventions of Englishmen. The former was patented in 1851, and the 
latter in 1853. Cartwright had attempted to accomplish combing by machinery in 
the latter eighteenth century, but his apparatus had not been successful practically. 
Indeed, until the inventions of Lister, Donisthorpe, Holden, and Noble, all within 
a decade, hand-combing had been the common practice in England itself. 

3 The Census of 1870 reported 66 combing machines of foreign manufacture out 
of a total of 161 in worsted mills. Some of the domestic-made combs may well have 
been of the Simpson variety, employed in the production of carpet yarns, which 
was still an important branch of the worsted industry. 

4 The spinning-jenny seems to have been employed previously for a brief time, 


but probably in household or domestic system for the most part. The first worsted 
spinning mill in England, erected in 1784, appears to have used the mule. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 329 


been the introduction of Arkwright’s spinning-frame in a modified 
form for both the drawing and spinning operations; and, indeed, 
frames of this general type are still employed universally in the 
drawing operations under the British method of worsted-yarn 
manufacture, and to some extent in worsted-spinning proper, as 
the so-called flyer-frame.1 But somewhere along 1840-1850 
another advance had been made in the British industry. This 
was the introduction of the cap spindle for worsted frame spin- 
ning, — a device invented by an American, Charles Danforth of 
Paterson, New Jersey, and already taken up and discarded by 
the cotton manufacture.” It was the latter type of improved 
spinning apparatus that first attracted the attention of American 
worsted-yarn manufacturers, — perhaps because of its greater 
productive capacity in comparison with the flyer-frame. The 
Hamilton Woolen Company, it is said, introduced cap spinning- 
frames into its factory at Southbridge as early as 1860, and 
this is claimed as the first use of such frames in the United 
States. And by the early seventies frame spinning with the 


1 The exact time when drawing-frames of the English model were brought to 
this country remains uncertain; but probably their introduction came at about the 
period when the other British apparatus, combs and spinning-frames, were being 
imported. 

In connection with drawing-frames, it is interesting to note that one device 
“universally adopted in all roving frames or speeders,”’ was of American origin. In 
1822 Aza Arnold of Rhode Island invented the so-called ‘‘compound gear,” “‘differ- 
ential box,” or “‘equation box,” which was patented the next year, and, subsequently, 
patented in England by one Houldsworth. Its function was to regulate “‘ the differ- 
ent velocities of spindle and bobbin, so that the surface of the bobbin, while increas- 
ing constantly in size (as the spinning proceeds), still preserves the same relation to 
the speed of the rollers”’ which are delivering the roving. See Webber, Manual 
of Power, p. 44; and Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 37. 

2 The ring spindle had displaced the cap apparatus in the cotton manufacture, 
at least for most types of cotton spinning. 

As regards the development in British worsted-spinning technique, see Forbes, 
Lectures on the Great Exhibition, 1851, pp. 310, 319; James, History of the Worsted 
Manufacture in England, pp. 346-347; James, Continuation and Additions to the 
History of Bradford, 1866, pp. 222-223; Ure, Dictionary of Aris, Manufactures, etc. 
(ed. 1878), p. 989; Cudworth, Worstedopolis, p. 66; Baines, in Journal of the Royal 
Statistical Society, 1859, p. 7. According to Baines, who gives the best approximate 
dates, “the old spinning frame, called the fly frame, generally used ten years ago,” 
had been by 1859 largely pressed out by “‘the new frame, called the bell frame” (or 
cap frame). 


330 THE MATURE FACTORY 


cap spindle was said to be spreading rapidly in the domestic 
manufacture.! 

Finally, there was advance in the finishing end of the industry, 
in the printing operation, — a process which had a special im- 
portance for the-delaine production. The printing of the woven 
fabric had at first been accomplished by hand, i. e., by the old 
block method. The Ballardvale Mills sent their goods to North 
Andover where they were printed by hand, and the Manchester 
Mill used the same method in its own shop. Soon, however, and 
again under the lead, it seems, of the Hamilton Woolen Company, 
the printing came to be done with cylindrical printing machines, 
— machines similar to those which the cotton-manufacturing 
industry had been using for some time.? 

By 1860, then, the technical difficulties of the young industry 
were overcome, or in the way of solution; and the road was being 
cleared for future development and industrial expansion. And 
the first indication of this advance was the introduction of a 
number of new fabrics. 

An increased supply of long English wool was made available 
for a decade after 1856 through the operation of the Canadian 
reciprocity treaty; and for the manipulation of this type of wool 
the Lister combing machines were specially adapted. By reason 
of these circumstances, as well as through mere imitation of British 
fabrics, the trend was toward the production of smooth, shiny, 
rather stiff cloths, — what were then generally called, and in 
England are still called, worsted “‘stuffs.”” The fabrics were made 
upon cotton warps, were generally piece-dyed in blacks or dark 
blues, and like the delaines were distinctly of the light-weight, 
dress-goods character. Modern cloths of nearest equivalence 
would be mohair summer suitings or alpaca coat-linings, the 
manufacture and use of the original goods having largely disap- 
peared in the United States. However, for a number of years 
in the sixties and seventies — the time when the yet stiffer 
and shinier crinoline cloth had some vogue — worsted stuff- 

1 Brief Record of the Hamilton Woolen Company, p. 2; Webber, Manual of Power, 
p. 46. 


2 Hayes, Report on the Exhibition of 1876, pp. 61-62; Art and Industry at 
the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 237. 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 331 


goods formed a prominent part of the domestic worsted-cloth 
manufacture. 

In addition to such fabrics, new goods were constantly being 
introduced, some of British and some of American origin. After 
the American industry had taken up the production of delaines, 
the British are said to have turned to stripes and plaids, and toa 
cloth called coburg which had quite a fashion. This latter was a 
piece-dyed, twilled fabric, also with a cotton warp, which the 
British made up in imitation of the all-wool French worsted cash- 
mere. And the American manufacturers were impelled to follow 
such leads.’ On the other hand, the American manufacture had 
made independent progress through the refinement of the earlier 
types of goods. For example, whereas the first delaines were 
spoken of as an indifferent quality of cloth, reference in later years 
is not infrequent to delaines made of relatively fine wool. In time 
progress in this direction was so great, and the convenience of 
differentiating such wools from the longer, lustrous wools of the 
later worsted manufacture became so important, that domestic 
wools suitable for the finer delaine production came to be denom- 
inated as “‘delaine”’ wools.? 

As a result of these several factors, a considerable diversity of 
worsted goods was being turned out in American mills by 1870. 
At an exhibition in 1869 the goods displayed were reported as 
follows: “‘ Besides the beautiful delaines, armures, and coburgs of 
the older manufacture, — the fabrics originated since the war, — 
the worsted plaid poplins, the Caledonian cloakings, serges, 
printed cashmeres, alpaca and mohair lustres, Roubaix poplins, 


1 Brief Outline of the Business of William Whitman & Company, p. 77. 

2 A writer in 1872 described the respective qualities of combing and delaine 
wools. The former “should have a staple from five to nine inches in length” and 
“is more valuable if lustrous.”’ They were derived from Leicester and Cotswold 
sheep and cross-bloods from these stocks. Delaine wools, on the other hand, 
“should have a length of staple say from three to five inches long..... Lustre is 
not expected of delaine wools, but strength, soundness, and softness to the touch 
are necessary.”’ The half-blood merino is given as typical of this variety (Bulletin, 
1872, p. 265). In modern parlance, delaine wools are fine combing wools from Ohio 
and the vicinity. 

On the adaptability of native wools to the delaine manufacture, see Hayes and 
Mudge, Report on the Exposition of 1867, vi, 25. 


232) THE MATURE FACTORY 


black mohair lustres, mohair poplins of all shades” together with 
lastings or prunellas, for ladies’ shoes, “‘for the first time success- 
fully manufactured here within the last two years.” 1 Other 
fabrics of the period included reps, baréges, grenadines, and bunt- 
ing. Yet from another, more modern point of view the range of 
these worsted cloths is rather narrow. Almost all of them were 
composed of cotton warp and wool filling. Indeed, with the ex- 
ception of bunting, webbings, and braids, — of which the first 
alone would be classified as a cloth, — no all-wool worsteds were 
made in this country at that time.” Moreover, not only were the 
soft, drapy dress-goods missing from the list, — the sort of fabric 
which is now produced from short, fine merino wool spun in the 
Continental method, — but also men’s-wear worsteds and white 
worsted goods were conspicuously absent. The production con- 
sisted, then, of a considerable number — described by contem- 
poraries as ‘‘an infinite variety’’ — of fabrics for female wear, 
running from the semi-soft delaines made from “‘delaine”’ wool to 
linings, lastings, and upholstery goods chiefly of the lustrous, stiff 
type. In 1870 the latter sort, the characteristic “stuff” goods, 
apparently predominated in the domestic output. 

The worsted manufacture, then, though of negligible propor- 
tions in 1830, had risen by 1870 to fill a substantial place in the 
American wool-manufacturing industry. At the latter date, 
judged by the value added by manufacture or by the number of 
employees, the worsted branch had come to constitute between 
1o and 15 per cent of the total industry. While no official 
data are available upon the constituent elements of the produc- 
tion at that time, a trade account of the period stated that ten or 
twelve mills were engaged upon worsted yarns, five or six on 
worsted reps, terry, and like goods, while apparently the bulk of 
the industry, including ‘‘ten or twelve of the largest mills of the 
country”’ were turning out delaines, alpacas, mohairs, Italian 

1 Bulletin, 1869, pp. 387, 386. 

2 Bulletin, 1884, p. 305. 

At this period, the British manufacturers were also chiefly engaged on cotton- 


warp fabrics. A writer in 1873 stated that “probably seven-eighths of the pieces 
now produced (in the Bradford district) are made with cotton warps’’ (Bulletin, 


1873, Pp. 420). 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCT 333 


cloths, and similar women’s-wear fabrics, indeed, ‘‘ everything 
known in dress goods of worsted, mohair, etc.””!!_ The manufac- 
ture had been well launched. Its permanence seemed assured, 
and its promise for the future bright. 

But why was the launching of the American worsted manu- 
facture so long delayed? As late as 1879 — when the first Amer- 
ican figures on machinery are available — there were only 337,000 
worsted spindles in the United States, whereas England contained 
over 2 million. And no discrepancy of such considerable magni- 
tude existed on the woolen side. At the date just mentioned, 
1879, the woolen spindleage was 1,770,000 and 2,740,000, respec- 
tively. Why such a difference in the time of development in the 
two cases? 

In search of explanation for such a difference, one would 
perhaps turn first to an inspection of tariff conditions. And here 
he would find what at first sight looks like a good case for the 
effectiveness of protection. In the earliest tariffs, to be sure, those 
through 1812, worsted goods and woolen cloths came under the 
same rates. They were taxed at rates which rose steadily under 
successive laws until imports bore a duty of 25 per cent under the 
act of 1812. ‘Then came differentiation between the duties on 
worsted stuffs and on woolen fabrics. In the act of 1816 the rate 
on worsted goods was 15 per cent, as compared with one of 25 
per cent upon woolen cloths. And such discriminatory treat- 
ment was continued in the period 1824-1832, while under the 
‘““Compromise Tariff”? worsted stuff goods were allowed free 
entry, though woolen fabrics were still substantially taxed. On 
the other hand, a substantial change of policy came in the acts 
of 1842 and 1846. Duties of 30 and 25 per cent, respectively, 
were imposed upon worsted goods — duties which were still 
lower than those upon the kindred woolen manufactures, but yet 
were appreciable.?, Now comes the interesting part. Under the 

1 Bulletin, 1870, pp. 145-146. Among the important mills mentioned in the 
dress-goods end were: the Pacific, Atlantic Delaine, Lowell, Manchester, and 
Hamilton. 

The Census of 1870, it will be recalled, reported 102 mills in the worsted industry. 


2 Under the act of 1857 the rate on worsted stuffs was reduced to 19 per cent, 
and in that of 1860 increased again to 30 per cent. In both cases, the rates were 


334 THE MATURE FACTORY 


regime of free importation for worsted fabrics, one hears exceed- 
ingly little of domestic production. After the imposition of the 
30 per cent rate in 1842, one finds the real commencement of such 
manufacture, the true initiation of mousseline-de-laine produc- 
tion. Seemingly, as I indicated above, the case argues strongly in 
favor of the effectiveness of protection. | 

I am not disposed to argue that the increased protection after 
1842 was not without effect. Unquestionably it would have a 
steadying influence upon the young industry. But in the early 
period when rates on woolen and on worsted fabrics were similar, 
there was growth in the one and not in the other manufacture. 
Moreover, even under the higher duties after 1842 the expansion 
of the domestic worsted industry was not great until the decade 
of the sixties. To explain adequately the difference of develop- 
ment in the two manufactures one must take other factors into 
consideration. The nature of the domestic wool supply in the 
early decades of the century was not conducive to the launching 
or expansion of the American worsted manufacture. The worsted 
manufacture and the merino cultivation had as yet nothing in 
common. Apparently, too, the character of the products prior 
to the invention of mousseline-de-laines did not support the de- 
velopment of domestic worsted production. Stuff-goods were 
fabrics too elegant for common consumption in the American 
homes, though probably in the larger towns such goods of foreign 
origin had some sale. But I would be inclined to put most em- 
phasis upon the state of technical equipment for worsted manu- 
facture. While the chief operations of the woolen branch were 
early transformed into machine or quasi-machine processes — at 
least in so far as they are so constituted today — one of the prim- 
ary and most important operations of the worsted manufacture, 
combing, remained long under the cramping control of hand work. 


lower than those imposed upon woolen cloths. In 1862 and thereafter, however, 
worsted goods were included under the same duties as woolen fabrics, and with the 
latter came to be subject to increasingly heavy rates. (For the purposes of accu- 
racy, note should be made that during practically the whole period of the 1883 
tariff worsted cloths, the heavier men’s-wear fabrics, were through interpretation — 
of the courts made dutiable as ‘‘manufactures not specially provided for” at rates 
which for goods of low value were less than upon similarly valued woolen cloths.) 


INCREASED DIVERSITY OF PRODUCTS 335 


Until combing machines had been invented and had been intro- 
duced into the United States, in short, until the automatic comb- 
ing process was thus secured, the worsted manufacture could 
have relatively small development in this country. With the 
general utilization of machine-combing in the sixties, and with 
other conditions favorable, — including a propitious tariff 
policy, — the manufacture was stabilized. 


CHAPTER XVII 
IMPORTATIONS 


THE importations of wool fabrics from abroad played a more im- 
portant rdéle in the period 1830-1870 than in any other period in 
our history, barring perhaps the few years immediately following 
the Peace of Ghent. In both volume and quality this movement 
has much significance. The period 1830-1870 embraced the dec- 
ade or more of the first real reaction from protection since the 
upward trend of import duties began, — the years under the low 
tariffs of 1846 and 1857. It was the first period, too, when the 
domestic industry could make appreciable resistance to the inflow 
of foreign goods. And, finally, this was the first period when the 
domestic manufacture had to face competition other than that 
of British origin. For such reasons particular weight may be 
given the history of importation. Incident to a general discus- 
sion of the import movement, certain aspects of the import trade 
deserve special emphasis, — particularly the fluctuation in the 
total movement during the several decades and under the several 
tariffs, changes in the composition of the incoming flow, and 
changes in the sources of that movement. 

The course of importation during the period 1830 to 1870 with 
respect to woolen cloths and dress-goods, the two most important 
items, tells an interesting story. Moreover, since importations 
of wool cloths and dress-goods composed in terms of value 80 to 
go per cent of all the wool-goods importations with which we are 
concerned (i. e., exclusive of carpets, knit-goods, and the like), 
and since the movement of such smaller factors as blankets and 
yarns was generally similar to that of the two major items, this 
story regarding cloths and dress-goods may be taken as indicative 
of the whole import movement in wool manufactures. 

1. The general trend of cloth and of dress-goods importations 
during these decades, at least until war conditions supervened, 
is evident in the accompanying graph (Figure 9); but certain 
features deserve special attention. First, the effects of the two 


336 


337 


IMPORTATIONS 


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338 THE MATURE FACTORY 


chief speculative movements culminating in 1837-1839 and in 
1857 are evident. In the earlier period the volume of imports 
showed an upward trend beginning in 1831, reached peaks in 1836 
and 1839, and subsided to more normal figures in 1841-1842. In 
the later period, action may be considered to have started by 
1850, when both cloths and dress-goods began to be purchased in 
particularly great volume; and imports of both increased rapidly 
for afew years. Then came forces which in some measure broke 
up the simple cyclical course, especially in the case of dress-goods. 
The importation of cloths attained its highest point in 1854, and 
thereafter generally declined except for a reaction in 1859-1860, 
which may well have been merely in anticipation of the coming 
change in tariff rates. While there are irregularities in this move- 
ment, on the whole it does not depart widely from the normal 
course of speculative up-and-down swing. Not so with dress- 
goods, however. With only momentary hesitations in 1855 and 
1858, imports of these fabrics rose steadily to 1860. There was 
indeed a persistent upward trend after 1843, barring the two years 
just mentioned, until in 1860 the total value of such importations 
reached a point seven times the average value of 1843-1845. 
These deviations of cloth and dress-goods import movements 
from what I have called the simple cyclical course may really be 
set apart with other irregular trends as giving a second peculi- 
arity to the decades under consideration. One should note, for 
example, that just prior to the beginning of the period, that is, 
in the twenties, dress-goods importations were much less than 
those of cloths; whereas by the thirties and forties they had come 
at least to equal, and by the fifties far to exceed, the latter. 
Again, for the later decades — from 1843-1845 to 1860 — curves 
representing both types of importations indicate an extraordinary 
advance in that movement. In some measure, to be sure, the 
figures reflect only the enhancement of world prices which began 
with the gold discoveries of 1849, in so far as they do not manifest 
merely the influence of the speculative up-swing of prices which 
preceded 1857. However, this is not sufficient explanation. The 
quantity of importations in terms of yardage also rose substan- 
tially. The country was demanding more foreign wares, and 


IMPORTATIONS 339 


various factors made possible increased foreign contribution to 
American supplies. Of these factors the most obvious are the 
tariff conditions, the relatively low tariff rates under the acts of 
1846 and 1857, whereby the competitive power of European in- 
dustries was increased. Thus, it is apparent that the years under 
the higher duties of the 1842 tariff formed a period of compara- 
tively low importations. Yet the tariff is by no means the whole 
affair. The downward movement of imports after 1837 had oc- 
curred despite declining tariff rates, and in the forties and fifties 
the upward trend continued though import duties were stable. 
Finally, as we shall see, there was a rise in importations during 
the sixties which accompanied markedly increased tariff rates; 
and, with respect to dress-goods, even the act of 1867 could not 
check the inward movement. Conditions more fundamental 
than the tariff duties were responsible for the more persistent and 
more pronounced trends, — including the relative movement of 
cloth and dress-goods imports above noted; and among these 
one may note the introduction of new fabrics, especially new 
worsted dress-goods, of which no sufficient domestic production 
as yet existed; the enhanced domestic demands for finer fabrics 
with the rising level of wealth in the United States; the advent 
of new competition through the incursion of French and German 
goods into the American market; and the increasing force of all 
foreign competition by virtue of specially quickened technical 
improvements abroad. More will be said of these features 
later. 

The war years, too, exhibited certain peculiar developments in 
the course of importations (see Figure 11).! Both cloths and dress- 
goods took prodigious slumps after 1860 and 1861, respectively, 
and recovery to more normal figures was slow. How shall one 
explain these vicissitudes? Surely the most obvious change in 
competitive conditions, the readjustments of the tariff, is not 
adequate. The first drop in importations was too great to be 
attributed to this single cause, and, as just suggested, the suc- 
ceeding years brought increased flow of foreign goods despite 
rising tariff rates. The proper explanation lies, I think, rather in 

1 See below, p. 383. 


340 THE MATURE FACTORY 


the dislocation of commercial arrangements which accompanied 
the war, the effective closing of the southern markets, and the like. 

Finally, the period closes with the inward movement in general 
still proceeding at a high level. The import of cloths, to be sure, 
had reacted after touching a high point for all time in 1866, —a 
high point occasioned apparently by the speculative movement 
that culminated in that year, and by anticipation of yet higher 
tariff duties.’ But the importation of dress-goods attained an 
average for the latter years of the sixties greater than for any 
earlier period of similar length. The height attained was in fact 
so great that, including dress-goods with the other wool goods 
imported, the general average of importations was still running 
high and still showed a particularly marked advance over the 
volume of imports at the beginning of the interval now under dis- 
cussion, i. e., the early years of the thirties. Absolutely the in- 
crease was well over three-fold. But perhaps more interesting 
and important was the share contributed by imports to the total 
domestic supply of wool manufactures at the two periods. 
Around 1830 importations formed something like a fifth of the 
total wool-cloth supply of the United States, that is, if we include 
in the latter the output of household looms.” On the other hand, 
at the time when we get the first adequate census figures of do- 
mestic factory production, 1849 and 1859, and when household 
operations had ceased to form so significant a proportion of total 
American cloth supply, the ratios of importations to the latter on 
the basis of values were 29 and 34 per cent, respectively. Evenin 
1869, after some decline in the import of cloths, foreign goods 
still formed about 25 per cent of the total domestic consumption.? 

1 The diversion of domestic manufacturing capacity in considerable measure to 
the satisfying of military demands was another significant factor. 

2 See above, p. 261. 

3 These ratios are based on the production and average annual importation 


(covering the three years around the census date) of cloths, dress-goods, blankets, 
flannels, and yarns. The detailed figures are as follows (in thousands of dollars) : 


Ratio of 
Census Importation Imports to 
year Production (duty paid) Total Total 
TSAO Say Cece a. bate nena aee $43,207 $17,470 $60,677 28.7 
TSSONV A Gee as ene ee ee 65,596 33,544 99,140 33-8 


860 ':iAloy. 1) pone tia tee ane ake eee 177,490 41,136 218,632 18.9 


IMPORTATIONS 341 


Consideration of the import movement from the viewpoint of 
consumption per head of population leads to somewhat the same 
conclusions. Importations per capita, whether on the basis of 
value or of quantity, move in sympathy with the fluctuations in 
general business conditions; and they manifest the same increase 
from about 1845 to 1860. The most striking feature of these 
figures, however, is the height to which they attained in the latter 
fifties. Though imports per capita had touched a similar height 
momentarily at the climax of the speculative movement before 
1837, they maintained a position in the later period — from 1854 
on — which was never before and has never since been reached.! 
By 1870 there had been some recession, but goods were still com- 


Since the value of domestic production in 1870 is inflated by the depreciation of the 
Greenbacks, whereas the value of importations (since these were based on foreign 
specie valuations and paid in gold) was not so affected, the ratio of imports to 
total consumption as above presented gives an erroneous picture. With best 
allowance for all the circumstances, a figure of 25 per cent would be more nearly 
correct. 

1 The per capita value of the importations of wool cloths and dress-goods by 
five-year intervals was as follows, the figures presented being averages for the three 
years.around the date quoted: 


TO AS EEL ee oes asin and ss $.63 TSS Oemr eee tare a8 my Marek $.56 
TOO MeOeeS US a keh heheh vac ss 49 TOSS ese teed tae a orate ans 85 
ROE IG cas Se emit ort aces rae aon 85 TLOOOmE re ene cee coke 83 
SUAVG) hl 2 ae, Peers ae eS .69 TSOS cme ew ice e ies eae. fae: 70 
TROVE OS OS aS ks ad ere at 42 TS7OiGe as hice. tale nee een 68 


With as close an approximation as possible, the average per capita importations of 
cloths and dress-goods in terms of quantity were: for 1827-1830, ‘I.93 yards, and 
for 1860, 3.22 yards. (The method used was to ascertain the British exportation 
of such goods in terms of yards, and increase this figure by the ratio between British 
and total imports of wool manufactures into the United States, stated in terms of 
value.) 

Dr. Clark (History of Manufactures, p. 248) gives an estimated increase over the 
same period of much greater magnitude: from one-quarter of a yard in 1827-1830 
to 1.50 yards (from England alone) in 1860. Such data, I believe, gives an erro- 
neous impression. I differ particularly as to the figure proper for the earlier period, 
1827-1830. Dr. Clark used Pitkin’s figures, but comparison of the latter with 
statistics from the British documents indicates that Pitkin erred. Again, and by 
reason of the same mistake on Pitkin’s part, Dr. Clark gives what seems to me an 
erroneous picture of the decrease in the value per yard of wool-cloth imports, — 
from $2.12 per yard in 1827-1830 to 18.8 cents a yard in 1860. The British export 
statistics show a decline from 1s. 5d. per yard in the former period to tod. a yard 
at the latter date. 


342 THE MATURE FACTORY 


ing in at a rate per inhabitant substantially higher than had pre- 
vailed in 1830. 

Roughly speaking, then, the period under discussion stretches 
from the close of one movement in importation to the commence- 
ment of a new phase in the general development. The years 
around 1830 covered the culmination of a downward trend in 
imports extending through the twenties. Then came the rise and 
fall through the speculative boom and collapse which reached 
over rather more than a decade. And this was followed by a 
movement even more pronounced, partly speculative, but partly 
not, — a movement that brought the volume of importations in 
t 1e latter fifties to a point of particularly great height. Finally, 
in the last years before 1870 the volume again rises to a level 
which really forms the starting point for the modern period, — 
a period when the quantity of the goods brought in tended to 
decline. Accordingly, the decades 1830 to 1870 embrace the 
years of most serious threat to the domestic manufacture from 
the assaults of foreign competition. 

2. Equally important, however, with the marked changes in the 
quantities of importations into the United States were the changes 
in the sources of those importations. During the greater part of 
our foregoing period, England had been practically the sole pur- 
veyor of goods for the American market. This was a situation 
to be expected. England had the most advanced wool manu- 
facture of the times, and she still held us by economic inter- 
ests despite political separation. Moreover, for many years in 
that period England alone of European wool-manufacturing 
nations had command of the seas. Even in the early twenties, 
according to a comparison in terms of value between English ex- 
ports and American imports of wool fabrics, that nation still 
supplied all but 5 per cent of the total. But later years in 
the same decade ushered in a change. By 1830, on the basis of 
a similar comparison, England was shipping only 80 to 85 per cent 
of the total. 

As the years passed, competition with England on the part of 


1 Allowance has been made for commissions and handling charges, but this must 
of course be largely pure estimate. 


IMPORTATIONS 343 


the other European nations became more and more successful, 
at least in divers lines. Germany was coming to the fore in the 
shipment of ‘‘cloths” and yarns. In 1850 she sent cloths which 
in value equaled 15 per cent of the total import of such goods; 
by 1860, 24 per cent; and in 1870, 38 per cent, — the last being 
a ratio not subsequently attained with respect to such goods.! 
Of the less important item of woolen and worsted yarns, Germany 
in 1860 and 1865 supplied over 70 per cent (in value). For a few 
years, too, France threatened severe competition. The French 
government in the years immediately following the Revolution 
of 1848 distributed a “prime” or bounty on the exportation of 
wool manufactures; and by 1850 that country was sending over 
a fourth (in value) of American imports of wool “‘cloths.” In 
later years, apparently after the cessation of the bounty, these 
imports from France rapidly dwindled, until in 1865 and 1870 
they did not amount to 5 per cent of the total. However, in 
certain lines, notably in stuffs or dress-goods and in blankets (in 
so far as the latter were imported), England still retained a domi- 
nant position. In worsted stuffs, she was sending 70 per cent in 
the fifties. After 1865 we were receiving from England 85 per 
cent of all ‘‘dress-goods”’ imported, — “‘dress-goods” being the 
title under which now were included all light-weight fabrics im- 
ported. While by 1870 this ratio had declined to 80 per cent, 
the competition of other European countries in this line became 
really severe only in the later decades. Of blankets, no country 
other than Great Britain has ever supplied any considerable pro- 
portion. Finally, with respect to all wool manufactures even, 
the ratio of England’s shipment as late as 1869-1871, 77% per 
cent, indicates that that country was still the dominant factor in 
the import trade into this country. Her position was not secure, 
for it was being assaulted by the rising industries of the Conti- 

1 The prominence of Forstmann & Huffman, a leading dress-goods manufactur- 
ing concern located in Passaic, New Jersey — it was erected as a branch of a Ger- 
man house in 1903 — lends interest to a passage to be found in the Tribune’s ac- 
count of the Exposition of 1853-1854: ‘Messrs. Foistmann & Huffman (sic), 
Werden-on-Ruhr, Prussia, are large manufacturers for the American market. So 
well known are their goods, that they are commonly called F & H goods, and are 


considered to be among the best of the foreign goods brought to America” (Art and 
Industry at the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 236). 


344 THE MATURE FACTORY 


nent, but as yet it had given way only in part. The growing 
diversity of origin for our imports merely foreshadows the de- 
velopments of the subsequent period, and in this movement the 
changing character of our importations played an important part. 

3. In some respects, the changes in the constituent elements of 
the import trade during the period 1830-1870 are wholly con- 
sistent with the promises held forth in the earlier decades. Thus, 
the decline in flannel imports had been specially marked in the 
middle and later twenties. To be sure, that was a novel situation 
as regards flannel imports, and there might have been question 
as to the permanence in these conditions. However, though 
the business expansion culminating in 1837 was strong enough to 
bring a small reaction, thereafter such imports again became 
negligible; and they remained negligible through the thirty years 
1840-1870, except for the brief period of the Civil War. In the 
latter sixties, the only flannel reported as largely imported was 
the so-called ‘‘opera”’ flannel, —a highly gigged and finished 
fabric, and, relatively speaking, a luxury article.1 The domestic 
flannel manufacture was for the most part solidly entrenched. 
Again, importation of broadcloths proceeded in about the fashion 
that one would expect from a knowledge of the domestic situ- 
ation with respect to this fabric. The American industry had 
turned aside from broadcloth production, and the popular de- 
mand for this sort of fabric was declining. What goods of this 
nature were required, therefore, came principally from abroad, 
but the importation was on a much lower level than it had been 
prior to 1830. A report in 1854 summed up the case well, when, 
admitting “‘the comparatively low position of the United States 
in the manufacture of fine broadcloths,’ it enumerated these 
fabrics — “‘fine broadcloths”’ and ‘“‘cloths of the finer sorts” — 
as chiefly drawn from foreign sources.” | 

1 Hayes, Report on Group IX at Exhibition of 1876, p. 51. See also Niles, xlviii, 
399; Joint Report of National Association of Wool Manufacturers and of Wool 
Growers to the United States Revenue Commission, 1866, p. 14; Hayes, Bulletin, 
1877, Dolte: 

* Hayes, Report on Exhibition of 1876, p. 41. See also Fleischmann, D. 373 


North, Bulletin, 1895, p. 44. ; 
The Census of 1860 (iii, p. xxxiii) has the following to say of foreign broadcloths: 


IMPORTATIONS 345 


In other lines importation was subject to new forces during the 
period under consideration. With the increased proficiency of 
the American industry, a higher quality of fabric could advan- 
tageously be produced in domestic mills. Thus, cassimeres of 
American manufacture came to dominate the domestic market, 
even the so-called fancy cassimere, whereas in the period before 
1830 the only type of wool fabric in which we were practically 
independent was the satinet, a substantially inferior grade of 
cloth. One hears of foreign types and designs in cassimeres, but 
chiefiy in connection with their adoption and manufacture in this 
country... The development of the Crompton loom and the 
adaptability of American wools to this variety of fabric rendered 
such production relatively secure even in periods of heavy gen- 
eral imports from abroad. In the production of delaines, also, 
the domestic manufacture acquired special strength. ‘The first 
cloths of this type had come from abroad, but they soon began 
to cut a considerable figure in American production, perhaps 
because, as one writer stated, “they had much of the flannel 
character.” * Commenced during the relatively high-tariff period 
of 1842-1846, the manufacture apparently did not suffer severely 
even in the later years of high general importation. Indeed, the 
Pacific Mills, organized particularly for the manufacture of this 
fabric, were launched in 1853, in the middle of the low-tariff era.’ 
It is improbable that importations of this and similar cloths 
ceased entirely, but apparently the domestic mills had been 


“The great and deserved popularity of the West of England superfine cloths, and 
the cheapness of all English broadcloths, produced by the cheap labor and perfect 
machinery now in use, the elegant finish of the French, and the lightness of the 
French and German cloths, which adapt them to our summer use, have (with 
‘the nature of the domestic wool) prevented our manufacturers from obtain- 
Ing possession of the home market under the low tariffs which have generally 
prevailed.” 

1 North, Bulletin, 1894, pp. 338, 350; Kittredge, Dry Goods Economist, 1896, 
p. 81. 

2 Hayes, Bulletin, 1877, p. 134. 

3 Whitman, Bulletin, 1911, p. 222. 

On course of delaine importation: see Brief Ouiline of the Business of William 
Whitman & Company, p. 77; Hayes and Mudge, Report on the Paris Exposition 
of 1867, vi, 25. 


346 THE MATURE FACTORY 


able to consolidate their position and to maintain a satisfactory 
output.! 

In the case of blankets the réle of imports was more significant. 
The domestic manufacture, it appears, had been stimulated by 
the cheap wool made available in a special degree by the tariffs 
of 1833 and 1842, and during these years, except for the up-swing 
of importations in the middle thirties, the quantity of blankets 
brought in was relatively low. Under the tariff of 1842, indeed, 
‘“‘nearly all the medium (grade) blankets consumed here were of 
domestic fabrication.” ? Then came a substantial increase in 
importations from 1846 to 1860, under the low duties of that 
period. In value importations nearly doubled between 1844- 
1846 and 1858-1860 (the former by no means a specially low 
point), while quantities seem to have increased in even greater 
measure. British exports of blankets to the United States rose 
from an average of something less than 1% million yards in 
1843-1845 to one of over 5% million yards in 1858-1860. 
While the domestic blanket manufacture continued to operate in 
moderate scope throughout these years, enhanced importations 
must indeed have proved a check upon any considerable move- 
ment of expansion. Such domestic production as persisted was 
apparently of the medium-quality goods above mentioned, while 
imports were either of the cheap grades suitable for southern 
consumption or of the better varieties to which domestic goods 
were admitted to be inferior.? —The domestic producers were able 
to secure dominance of the American market only when tariff 
rates began to rise with the Morrill act of 1861. By the end 
of the sixties, English exports of blankets to the United States 
hardly exceeded 100,000 yards. The tariff duties were peculiarly 
effective. 

Experience different from any of the foregoing occurred in the 
case of dress-goods. This was the importation which responded 

1 During the Civil War period other additions were made to the list of fabrics in 
the production of which we were largely self-sufficient. Apparently among these 
were “the Esquimaux and Moscow beavers, which we have imitated from the 
Germans”’ (Hayes and Mudge, Report on the Paris Exposition of 1867, vi, 21). 


2 Bulletin, 1881, p. 383. 
3 Art and Industry at the Crystal Palace, 1853, p. 215. 


IMPORTATIONS 347 


least to variations in import duties, or perhaps better, it was an 
importation which showed the influence of other factors to be 
fully as important as that of the tariff. It will be noted, for 
example, that between 1830 and 1870 a marked change had come 
in the relative positions of cloth and dress-goods importations 
(see chart above). Whereas around the earlier date imports of 
cloths had averaged something like two and a half times those of 
the lighter fabrics in terms of value, by the close of the period 
the relations were reversed. Indeed, each decade manifested 
with respect to dress goods a higher level of importation than the 
preceding, — the level under the relatively high tariff of 1842 
being substantially higher than it was a decade earlier, — until in 
1859-1861 the value of such imports was over ten times the cor- 
responding figure for 1828-1830. 

In terms of quantity the increase was even greater. Not only 
was there a decrease in the unit price of such goods, but in the 
interim dress-goods of cotton warp had been introduced, —a 
feature which, appearing in the manufacture of the Bradford 
(England) district first in 1834, changed the whole face of this 
light-weight trade. In the latter fifties, these cotton-warp fab- 
rics, or “mixed stuff goods,” were exported to this country from 
England alone in quantities as great as 40 million yards a year. 
Adding the relatively small volume of all-wool goods, the ex- 
portations of “‘stuffs’’ from England to the United States aver- 
aged nearly 43 million yards, as compared with some 700,000 
yards in 1828-1830. Nor is this all; for at the earlier dates 
England was practically our only source of such goods, and by 
1860 she was supplying us with only 70 per cent of our dress- 
goods purchases, measured in terms of value. 

Finally, it may be noted that after a precipitate and extraor- 
dinary decline in such importation during the first years of the 
war, — falling from an average value of 19 million dollars in 
1859-1861 to one of a few hundred thousand dollars in 1861— 
1862, — a revival soon appeared. By 1870, even despite the high 
tariff of 1867, this trade, measured in terms either of value or of 
quantity, was on the road to new heights, astounding even com- 
pared with those reached in 1859-1861. 


348 THE MATURE FACTORY 


An increase of importation so long continued demands ex- 
planation; nor is the explanation difficult, at least in part. The 
manufacture of light-weight fabrics of the dress-goods type was 
slow in developing in the United States. Linsey-woolsey, flannel, 
and homespun were the fabrics for women’s wear, offered by 
earlier domestic production, with perhaps some of the lighter 
satinets; and none of these could compare in sightliness with 
‘stuff’? goods. As domestic wealth increased and the style in- 
fluence extended its domain, worsted fabrics came into ever 
greater demand, — and as yet the United States boasted scarce 
a single worsted spindle. With the rise of delaine and similar 
manufacture in the forties and fifties, a small supply of dress- 
goods from domestic sources became available; but in volume, 
and particularly in range of variety and quality, the American 
industry at that time was deficient, as, for'example, in mohairs, 
lustres, all-wool merinos and cashmeres, and the like. And some- 
thing of this situation persisted, even after the Civil War. The 
late start continued to handicap the domestic production of 
dress-goods for many years; the stimulus given that production 
by free entry of Canadian long wools came to an end in 1866; 
foreign industries ever devised new fabrics; and shortly there- 
after soft fabrics of the Continental type began to find favor in 
the American market. These several factors conspired to pro- 
long the period during which foreign light-weight fabrics should 
play an important part in the supply of the domestic market. 
In fact, not until after the tariff of 1897 did a marked decrease 
in such importations occur. 7 

The period 1830-1870 closes, then, with a peculiarly divided 
prospect. In the woolen branch, there was calm as after a storm. 
The domestic production had weathered the heavy importations 
of the fifties and now could ride at ease behind the protecting 
wall which had been gradually built up since 1861. Imports, 
though still considerable, did not threaten to increase, and the 
domestic industry by increasing effectiveness in its operations 


1 See above, pp. 324-332, for additions from time to time to domestic production; 
also, Bulletin, 1874, p. 11; and Hayes, in Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, 


P- 455: 


IMPORTATIONS 349 


could indeed look forward to curtailing sooner or later the field 
supplied from abroad. On the other hand, the worsted manu- 
facture, as yet of a restricted scope as far as character of pro- 
duction was concerned, was still suffering from heavy foreign 
shipments. The industry itself was young and of questionable 
strength. The future was uncertain. This difference in the posi- 
tion of the two pranches is striking; and of course, reflects chiefly 
the difference in historical development. It is the more note- 
worthy because the following decades were to make such a change, 
as the worsted manufacture rushed to the front as the conspic- 
uously capable and sturdy section of the wool-manufacturing 
industry. 


CHAPTER XVIII 
TECHNICAL ADVANCE 


ALTHOUGH the period before 1830 had been one of extraordinary 
technical progress, improvement of machinery and processes is 
not the monopoly of any era. In some ways the headway made 
during the decades 1830 to 1870 was even more interesting than 
that of the earlier period. Many of the changes of the earlier 
times were borrowings from abroad; many were the initial steps 
in the attainment of real machine operation after the basis of 
modern machine fabrication had been laid through the contribu- 
tions of foreign and of domestic invention; and all took place 
under general economic conditions which, like the specific con- 
ditions of the tariff, were on the whole favorable to the domestic 
manufacture. In the years after 1830, and especially those after 
1840, conditions were not so comfortable for the domestic cloth 
production, particularly with the increasing influx of importa- 
tions. Yet improvement continued; and in certain portions of 
the manufacture important gains were registered. To appreciate 
the situation of the American manufacture in all its aspects, a 
review of the particular advances made during these decades is 
peculiarly valuable. 

In connection with the discussion of other matters, some of the 
major developments in the period 1830-1870 have already been 
described: the introduction of burring apparatus for use in con- 
junction with carding machines, the improvement in character 
and increase in speed of looms, and the importation of worsted 
preparing and spinning machinery.! These advances were of 
special influence in facilitating changes in the types or qualities 
of domestic cloth production. But there were other advances 
less intimately related to this particular phase of our history 
which deserve consideration here. It will be convenient to 


1 See above, pp. 307-309, 310-312, 313-314, 327-330. 
35° 





THE FINISHER SECTION OF A CARDING MACHINE OF THE SIXTIES 


Showing the roller condensers of that period 








THE FOREPART OF A DOUBLE BREAKER CARD OF THE SIXTIES 
Showing the hand-feeding apparatus 








TECHNICAL ADVANCE 351 


examine the chief operations of the manufacture to ascertain the 
conditions which prevailed in 1870, and the source and character 
of new apparatus; and to these features may be added some 
comparison with foreign developments. 

The year 1870 found methods and mechanisms for cleaning the 
wool fiber much changed or in process of modification, as com- 
pared with earlier practice. This operation covers the removal 
from the wool of the dirt, grease, and suint with which the fleece 
is impregnated when first clipped from the sheep’s back; and, 
in 1830, it was still conducted in a crude fashion, both chemically 
and mechanically. Of the chemical changes that brought the: 
industry to modern practices, little is known; but apparently 
by 1870 the use of more scientific means, involving treatment by 
potash and soda soaps, had become fairly general. Cleansing 
could be prosecuted with greater care and accuracy, diminishing 
the danger of damage to the wool fibers, and yet assuring a wholly 
clean product. By reason of the influence of such improved 
conditions upon the whole series of subsequent manufacturing 
processes, this change in method may be regarded as of a par- 
ticularly fundamental type. 

But modifications of apparatus were equally important. The 
early equipment consisted of large troughs or bowls in which the 
wool was immersed. There the wool was soaked, and stirred 
more or less continually by men armed with long poles. When 
the cleansing was deemed to have progressed sufficiently, the 
wool had to be laboriously fished out and spread to dry ina room 
specially devoted to that purpose. Such arrangements were ob- 
viously labor-consuming in a high degree. Efforts to reduce the 
labor element probably occurred in the American industry, 
though we have no definite information. Surely the successful 
advances were made elsewhere, and subsequently introduced 
into the United States. A machine invented in 1835 by one 
Garcel, seemingly of France, is regarded by Grothe as the basis 
of all subsequent developments.! Improved by divers contribu- 
tions, — French, Belgian, English, and German, — the apparatus 
may be said to have reached its modern form when John Petrie 

1 Grothe, Technologie der Gespinnstfasern, p. 84. 


352 THE MATURE FACTORY 


of Rochdale, England, and Eugene Melen of Verviers, Belgium, 
brought out their‘machines, around 1860.1 American mechan- 
isms have followed the lines laid down in these foreign devices. 
However, whatever the origin, the American manufacturing in- 


f] 
Ory 
















oF 


7 ’ 
fy \ 

Alioth — are 
7, \ — OZ 

; \ ad GF ZA 

az FA Oe 
/ C\\ Bog VS RAIOIR 

oS 4, 
I gp > 









Fic. 10. Working Parts of a mitesrah (a McNaught model of about 
1860). 


dustry was by 1870 in the way of securing a material addition to 
its effectiveness through the adoption of this new labor-saving 
apparatus. Thereafter the raw wool was thrown into one end of 
a series of long bowls or troughs which were each supplied sepa- 
rately with water and chemicals and which could be separately 
drained. The wool was acted upon and pushed forward by me- 
chanical rakes, and was squeezed by sets of rollers both between 
bowls and at the final delivery end. As one may easily see from 
this description, hand-labor was almost wholly eliminated. But 
the further facts are noteworthy: that the work was more effec- 
tively done than it could ever have been accomplished under the 
older method; and that the new apparatus was particularly 
adaptable to the handling of large weights of wool. It was ap- 
paratus, indeed, which fitted in exceptionally well with American 
requirements. 

The equipment of the carding process had also undergone ap- 
preciable modification in the years after 1830. First, there was 
a widening of the carding machines. The original Scholfield card 
had been 24 inches wide, but by 1830, 36-inch machines were 
coming in.. The latter remained for many years the standard 
equipment of American mills. Even in the latter fifties the 


1 The exact dates of the respective patents are 1859 for Petrie and 1863 for 
Melen. } 


TECHNICAL ADVANCE 353 


Stevens mills at North Andover retained that type. During this 
period, however, came the introduction of 4o and 48-inch ap- 
paratus, the first Census figures on the matter, those for 1890 
showing half the machines in American factories to be of the 
last, 48-inch variety.1 Again, alteration had meanwhile come in 
the intermediate feeds and in condensing. In the early, three- 
part carding machines, the wool had been doffed from the final 
cylinder of the breaker card, and from that of the intermediate 
or second card, in the form of a broad sheet of fibers. This sheet 
was wrapped upon a roller, and from that fed into the succeeding 
portion of the apparatus. Such a method did not permit mixing 
of the wool in the thorough degree desirable: the various sec- 
tions in the web of wool retained the same position relative to 
the other sections of the web in each successive machine. This 
hindered the manufacture of uniform, even yarn. Then, at some 
time soon after 1830, if not before, came an improvement: the 
introduction of so-called ‘‘side-drawing” from the first and 
second (or intermediate) breakers.?2 The wool fibers loosed from 
the final cylinder of the breaker were drawn to one side of the 
carding machine and passed through a revolving cylinder which 
smoothed the strand, imparting what was known as a false twist. 
The strand was wound upon spools, this part of the operation 
being known as “‘balling.”’ A frame containing a number of 
these spools, sometimes as many as forty, was set up before the 


1 North, Bulletin, 1894, p. 345; American Wool and Cotion Reporter, 1909, p. 879; 
Interview with William H. Jowett, for sixty years employed by M. T. Stevens & 
Sons Company. 

2 Mr. Davis of Davis & Furber, machine builders, testifying at the Goulding 
trial in 1865; quoted by North, Bulletin, 1901, pp. 267, 269; D.C. Fisher, in 
American Wool and Coiton Reporter, 1909, p. 879. 

The carding operation is in reality carried through upon two or three separate 
machines, sometimes lumped together and called a “‘carding machine.’’ Each of 
these separate machines has a main cylinder or “‘breast,”’ or two large cylinders of 
equal size. In England the general practice is to employ two machines, one single 
and one double breasted, for the carding operation; while in the United States, 
both the English practice and that of three single breasted machines are employed, 
though the three-part apparatus is the more common. In the latter case, the first 
machine is called the ‘“‘breaker;” the second, the “second” or “intermediate 
breaker;” and the third, the “‘finisher.”” The description:in the text proceeds on 
the basis of this three-part machinery. 


354 THE MATURE FACTORY 


feed end of the succeeding part of the card, the second breaker or 
the finisher. Subsequently, apparently around 1860, the con- 
tents of several short spools were wound upon one long one to be 
placed as was the rack of small ones. 

The side-drawing and balling attachment is noteworthy as the 
first attempt to provide for a mixture of the fibers in the carding 
batch by means of a labor-saving device at the stage of transfer 
between parts of the carding machinery, — a practice now almost 
universal. If the wool fell loose from the last cylinder of the 
breaker or intermediate card, as in the earliest carding arrange- 
ments, it would be mixed, to be sure, in the process of hand- 
feeding at the succeeding engine; but obviously that involved 
much labor. The lap system just mentioned, in which the sheet 
of wool was wound upon a cylinder and fed therefrom into the 
next machine, was economical of labor, but no general mixing of 
the fibers was possible. By the balling or side-drawing system, 
however, batches of fibers which had followed one another in the 
first machine were fed in together in the second, and fibers from 
one section of the web were mixed with those from other sections. 
This tended to produce a more homogeneous series of rovings at 
the delivery from the finisher card. Such rovings, in turn, would 
be less liable to breakage in the spinning operation, and would 
yield superior yarn. Moreover, this mixture could be secured, 
if the balling system were used, without the employment of 
much labor. 

The idea of side-drawing was unquestionably English, said to 
have been invented by one Robert Peele as early as 1779; but 
apparently it was then applied only to cotton carding.” Its 
adaptation to woolen carding may also have come in England, — 
I can find no evidence bearing either way, — but surely wide 
utilization of the apparatus came first in the United States. 
While it was spreading in this country in the thirties, the first 
reference to its use in England is under date of 1853, and that 


1 Considerable mixing of the fibers would, indeed, take place if several laps were 
fed together into the succeeding portion of the carding machine; though even a 
greater intermixture would be possible through the side-drawing method. 

? Bramwell, The Wool-Carders’ Vade Mecum, p. 133. 


TECHNICAL ADVANCE 355 


reference does not imply a general knowledge of the mechanism.1 
Toward the end of the period 1830-1870, however, the English 
manufacturers were not only catching up through the wider 
adoption of the balling system, but were stealing a march on the 
American. In or about 1850 the Apperley “‘feed’’ was invented 
in England and its construction and sale begun.” This, like the 
balling arrangement, was in essence merely a means of transfer- 
ring the wool from the delivery end of one machine to the feed 
end of the next. Similar to it in some respects was the so-called 
Scotch feed, which seems to have been introduced not long after 
the Apperley.* At least both are spoken of by 1870 as rather 
common features of English woolen mills. Apparently, too, 
these varieties of apparatus were by that time far from unknown 


1 Ibberson, The Woolen Manufacturers’ Guide, 1853, p. 13: “‘The downy wool or 
sliver should be doffed from the scribbler in the ordinary way, but the sliver must 
run through a revolving tube, and between two iron rollers on to a large bobbin, as 
a necessary preparation for the self-acting feeder” of the carding engine. 

Bischoff (A Comprehensive History of the Woolen and Worsted Manufactures, 
1842, ii. 392), quoting from a description which ‘‘ was published in September last,’’ 
—so evidently a recent account, — speaks of the wool being delivered from the 
scribbler: ‘‘The wool is wound around a revolving roller in an endless fleece, hav- 
ing the appearance of a fine blanket.’”’ Obviously, this was the lap system already 
being discarded in the United States. Again, Dodd (The Textile Manufactures of 
Great Britain, 1851, p. 99), a less accurate writer, states that ‘‘the wool falls from 
the last cylinder (of the scribbler) in a state of a light, flocculent, downy layer,’’ — 
a still less advanced method. 

2 Bramwell, p. 228. By the Apperley “feed,” the wool stripped from the doffer 
cylinder by the vibrating doffer comb is formed into a large, rounded strand. Then 
it is carried to the feeding apron of the next machine by an automatic device, and 
laid upon that apron in diagonal lines. 

3 In the Scotch ‘‘feed”’ or intermediate transfer apparatus, the wool stripped 
from the doffer is removed in a continuous ribbon of fibers six or eight inches broad. 
This ribbon is carried mechanically to the feed-apron of the succeeding machine, 
and deposited in a line parallel to the licker-in cylinders, but in such manner that 
each successive line or layer overlaps somewhat on the preceding one. 

This apparatus was never popular in the United States. In fact, it is not much 
employed in American mills, although latterly it has been coming into greater use. 
Probably this disregard is accounted for by its close sequence upon the Apperley 
““feed,”’ which was widely adopted in American mills and is now almost universally 
employed here. In England, however, while the balling system is still occasionally 
used, and while, indeed, an improved type of lap arrangement (the Blamire) is not 
infrequently to be found, the Scotch feed apparatus is perhaps the most usual 
variety, even more usual than the Apperley so popular here. 


356 THE MATURE FACTORY 


on the Continent.! The advance of such devices over the ball- 
ing method was two-fold: the transfer was accomplished with- 
out the employment of labor, once the proper adjustments were 
made and the machine started; and, again, they gave a more 
efficient mixture of the wool fibers than did the balling system, 
a feature preferable for most purposes.? Though probably it was 
not until the latter years of the period 1830-1870 that these de- 
vices came into general employment even in English mills, it was 
even later that they played any considerable part in American 
practice. Indeed, I have found no reference to any utilization 
whatsoever of either mechanism in our mills prior to the close of 
that era.? 

With respect to the final removal of the wool from the last or 
finisher card, advances had also been made in the American in- 
dustry. Not only did the Goulding condenser complete its con- 
quest of the domestic field,* but improvements were made in its 
construction. Chief among these was the substitution of rubbers 
for the older revolving tubes. Both devices, it may be suggested, 
aimed at giving a smoothness and a moderate consistency to the 
roping which was being drawn from the ring doffer. The first 
type of rubbing device was, seemingly, the so-called “three-roll 
rub,” introduced sometime in the thirties. This variety con- 
tained three pair of rollers as wide as the carding machine, 

1 For example, Alcan places the adoption of the Apperley attachment in France 
in 1862-1867 (Bulletin, 1870, p. 427). 

2 As will appear later, the Apperley feed sacrificed parallelization of the wool 
fibers, one of the aims in the carding operation, to the mixing of these fibers, an- 
other chief purpose of that operation. The increased use of the Scotch feed in the 
United States during the last decade or so may perhaps be interpreted as a late 
appreciation of this fact. 

3 On the Continent there were the beginnings of another interesting and im- 
portant development, though it came so near the close of the period under discus- 
sion that it probably had little effect until after 1870. In 1864, a Belgian, one Jean 
Sebastian Bolette, had invented a mechanism for feeding automatically the loose 
wool into the first or breaker card. This device, probably not the original one look- 
ing in the same direction, was the forerunner of Bramwell’s “automatic feed”” which 
has come to be the standard mechanism in both the British and American indus- 
tries. It is of special importance in that it eliminated the hand labor theretofore 
necessary in the weighing of the wool and its even distribution on the feeding apron, 


at the feed end of the breaker card (Bramwell, p. 212). 
4 See above, pp. 102-105, for introduction of Goulding condenser. 


TECHNICAL ADVANCE 357 


covered with rubber, between which the ropings passed. These 
rollers were made not only to revolve but also to oscillate side- 
wise at the same time. Revolving with a surface speed in pre- 
determined proportions to the forward movement of the line of 
ropings, — there being some incidental draft introduced into the 
woolen strands, — these rollers by their oscillation imparted a 
smoothness and a compactness, or ‘‘false twist,’’ to the ropings, 
which could not be secured by the use of revolving tubes. 

In the thirties, carding machines with rubbing attachments 
were not being turned out in any considerable volume. Accord- 
ing to a representative of the principal woolen-machine manufac- 
turers, his concern was then making “one machine with rubbers 
to twenty machines with tubes.” But gradually the demand for 
such devices spread. By the middle sixties, these same builders 
were turning out an equal number of rubber and tube machines; 
and ‘“‘the seven-roll rubber,’’ which had come into use within the 
last three or four years, and which was considered ‘‘a very good 
thing,’ had been “gradually driving out the tubes.” + Again, 
as indicated by this last quotation, the rubbing device was being 
improved during the same interval. This builder was in 1865 
making ‘‘three, five, seven, and nine-roll rubbers.”? By multi- 
plication in the number of rubbing rollers, the line of ropings 
drawn from the card could be divided and each half or each third 
treated separately, and so with somewhat better results. Such 
American improvements as these, it may be added, were fully 
abreast of foreign practice, except for the fact that at the very 
close of the period 1830-1870 the so-called tape condenser was 
beginning to be introduced abroad. This device, invented by 
Celestin Martin of Verviers, permitted a more minute division 
of the wool-web drawn off the final card cylinder; and accord- 
ingly was specially adapted to the manufacture of fine yarns. In 


1 Mr. Davis of the Davis & Furber Machine Company, at the Goulding trial; 
quoted by North, Bulletin, 1901, p. 270. 

2 Bulletin, 1901, p. 269. 

3 Ultimately, to secure greater rubbing power, machines with as many as fifteen 
rubbing rollers were employed. But in the seventies and eighties came a simplifica- 
tion of the mechanism through the introduction of rubbing aprons — of which 
more later. 


358 THE MATURE FACTORY 


later years it became of greater significance to the domestic wool- 
manufacturing industry. In 1870, however, the older method 
as now improved was of sufficient fineness for the quality of 
fabric turned out by American mills at the time.! 

On the whole, the carding process had been much bettered in 
nicety and effectiveness of performance in the decades preceding 
1870. While not fully in line with the European developments, 
it was nevertheless in far different shape than it had been forty 
years earlier. Particularly significant had been the changes 
which meant increased productivity through large-scale opera- 
tions and the attainment of better quality of product. 

Let us turn to a consideration of woolen spinning. Here a 
situation existed in the period 1830-1870 quite different from 
that with respect to wool-cleansing or wool-carding. It was a 
period of relative stagnation. The course of development in the 
United States during these decades consisted, with negligible 
exceptions, solely in the extension of the semi-automatic jack de- 
vised in the earlier period. By the latter sixties, despite the diffi- 
culties, frequently voiced, which the employment of jack-spinners 
involved, and despite the example of the cotton manufacture,” 
little progress had been made in the institution in woolen spin- 
ning of equipment other than jacks. There are isolated cases 
such as that at Manchester, New Hampshire, where mules, im- 
ported from England, were utilized;* but an author writing 
in 1869 of twenty-five years’ experience in woolen spinning 
speaks only of the old jacks.* In short, the earlier technique 
remained. 

To secure a basis for assessing the possible fault of the domestic — 
industry, contrast may be made with the advance in foreign coun- 


1 As to introduction of tube condensers into the United States, see above, p. 
103. 

2 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 41. Besides the invention of Richard 
Roberts, a self-actor for use in the cotton industry was independently evolved by 
Ira Gay of the Nashua Machine Shop, — a machine which was employed in a few 
cases, — and another self-acting mule was constructed by Mr. Mason of Taunton, 
Massachusetts, in 1837, and used rather widely in the cotton manufacture. 

3 Wallis’s Report, British Documents, 1854 [1717], p. 22; Webber, Manual of 
Power, p. 54. For other cases, see below, Vol. II, p. go, note 2. 

4 Demond, Twenty-five Years’ Experience in Wool-Carding and Spinning, 1869. 


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SHILA AHL AO MOVE ONINNIdS AHL 





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TECHNICAL ADVANCE 359 


tries. In England, Richard Roberts, who in 1825 had devised 
the automatic mule for use in the cotton industry, in 1832 
patented his so-called radial arm, or sector. This latter device 
made the self-acting mule applicable to woolen spinning.! Then 
followed a gradual adoption of the new mechanism, as for ex- 
ample in Huddersfield by 1839. By 1870 it could be said that 
*‘self-acting mules have become common, and as existing mules 
require replacing, self-acting mules will soon become universal.”’ ” 
In France progress was less rapid. In spinning equipment the 
wool-manufacturing industry at the middle of the century found 
itself then “‘much less advanced” than did the cotton manu- 
facture.® Still, toward the close of the sixties, the ‘“‘mule-jenny 
automatique” had been adopted “in the majority of the large 
establishments that manufacture woolens or worsteds;’’* or, 
according to another writer, this machine “was coming into 
general use”’ in the spinning of wool.’ Only a few years later, in 
1878, an official reporter on the international exhibition of that 
year pointed a period to the story regarding the adoption of the 
“‘self-acting:” “La transformation est complete. . . . Le der- 
nier mule-jenny doit avoir vécu.” ® Even in Germany, where one 
would of course expect rather tardy development on account of 
the late appearance of the industrial revolution, some advance 
in this line had occurred. Quandt indicates that the adop- 
tion of the ‘‘Selfactor’”’ had commenced in the sixties, and that 

1 Bramwell, op. cit., p. 381. 

* Baines, Yorkshire Past and Present, 1870, p. 665. See also Bowley, Journal 
of the Royal Statistical Society, 1902, p. 120. 

3 Picard, op. cit., iv, pp. 202-203. Picard narrates that manufacturers of the 
period relied on fulling and finishing to cover up the defects in spinning; and that 
they even contemplated the supersession of weaving by felting. 

Ao 107d., 91). -200. 

5 Chevalier, Introduction to Rapporis du Jury International at the Exposition of 
1867, p. 162. Alcan speaks of both the self-acting mule jenny and of the “‘demi self- 
acting”’ (‘ot le renvidage a lieu 4 la main’’) in his treatise written in 1867 (Traité 
du Travail des Laines, i, 465). See also American Consular Reports, No. 23, 1882, 
p. 124. 

6 Levasseur, Questions Ouvriéres et Industrielles, p. 105. According to Levasseur, 
the older mule-jenny had around 200 spindles, while the “‘self-acting”’ held 500 or 
more. Yet for the superintendence of either, only a spinner and two piecers were 
necessary (ibid.,note1). See also Levasseur, Histoire des Classes Ouvriéres, ii, p. 563; 
and American Consular Reports, No. 23, 1882, pp. 124-125. 


360 THE MATURE FACTORY 


this movement reached the distant Niederlausitz in the early 
seventies.! | i | 

Obviously, then, the American industry had failed to keep 
pace with foreign developments as far as machinery for wool 
spinning is concerned, especially compared with developments 
in England and France. But the question why this should have 
been the case is difficult to answer. The great value of such an 
automatic machine was well recognized. As one writer put the 
technical aspect: ‘‘It is well known that the quality of woolen 
yarn, especially as regards strength and smoothness, depends 
much on proper and judicious draft. The draft of the common 
spinning jack is lateral, and under the control of the person 
operating the same. No two spinners control this draft or draw 
alike, and consequently we get good and indifferent yarn from 
the same lot of roping.”’? Again, the character of the men em- 
ployed to operate these machines was a subject of unanimous 
complaint. Manufacturers claimed that one of the greatest 
evils with which they had to contend was the circumstance ‘that 
they were subject to men employed as jack-spinners, who were 
generally foreigners, and had brought with them the disorderly 
habits of English workmen.” * Drunkenness and consequent 
irregularity of their work were specially complained of, as well 
as their insolent bearing. But the reasons advanced then and 
subsequently to explain the failure of American mills to follow 
the lead of both the domestic cotton manufacture and foreign 
woolen manufactures seem of no considerable weight. The op- 
position of the jack-spinners is sometimes spoken of; but as yet 
there existed no organization of such workers to make their op- 
position effective on any appreciable scale. It is also alleged 
that the mules were too heavy and not well adapted to American 
conditions. Thus: ‘Spinning in large establishments abroad is 

1 Quandt, Die Niederlausitzer Schafwollindustrie, p. 177. See also Grothe, op. 
cit., p. 568; Wachs, op. cit., p. 38. 

2 Advertisement of a spinning machine invented by Goulding: Worcester Spy, 
April 1, 186s. 

8 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, p. 31. Hayes was obviously in error 


when he stated (p. 32) that self-actors ‘‘have been tried in England with but little 
success.” 


TECHNICAL ADVANCE 361 


usually performed by mules, while jack spinning is more generally 

adopted in New England as better suited to the different quali- 
- ties and quantities of yarns demanded by the variety of fabrics 
usually produced in our mills.””! Such explanation, however, is 
not wholly acceptable, since it is improbable that the diversity of 
production in American mills was any greater than that of most 
foreign establishments, e. g., in the fancy-goods industry about 
Huddersfield, where the introduction of self-acting mules began 
early. The true explanation seems to lie in the force of inertia. 
Given a body of skilled operatives such as the jack-spinners, the 
spinning operation could be carried out with less attention from 
the manufacturer himself if jacks were used than if self-operating 
mules were employed. For example, changes necessary for shift- 
ing production from one count or quality of yarn to another were 
much simpler, since much of the responsibility fell directly on 
the jack-spinner. Accordingly the mill-owners were not inclined 
to make a change. To be sure, the growth of the wholesale cloth- 
ing industry, with the effects of that development in increasing 
the average size of order for cloth, may have added to the ad- 
vantages which could be secured from the employment of the 
self-acting mule; but the influence of that industry had not be- 
come sufficiently great by the decade of the seventies to be a 
determining factor. The American woolen manufacture, in 
truth, cannot be relieved of serious criticism in this regard. 
What ultimately occurred in the seventies might well have been 
brought about many years earlier. 

Of technical changes in the younger branch of the domestic 
wool manufacture, the worsted industry, little need here be 
added with respect to yarn preparation beyond what has already 
been said.? In origin, worsted machinery was altogether foreign. 
To be sure, specific devices employed in worsted-yarn production 
had first come from the United States, but the essential step of 
adaptation had been made abroad. When American manufac- 
turers sought to establish the industry in the United States, they 


1 Hayes and Mudge, Report on the Paris Exposition of 1867, vi, 29; and interview 
with Mr. Archer of the Blackinton Woolen Company, North Adams, Massachu- 
setts, who in 1915 had been working fifty-eight years for that concern. 

2 See above, pp. 327-330. 


362 THE MATURE FACTORY 


went to England for mechanisms to cover the whole production, 
—and in view of the age and advanced development of the 
worsted manufacture in England, such a course was one which 
might well be expected. Similarly, in consideration of the rela- 
tive youth of the American industry prior to 1870, especially 
the recent acquisition of any considerable production, probably 
we should not be surprised that no independent advance in tech- 
nology had been registered in the United States before that date. 
Surely, there was no such advance. ‘In this department of the 
textile industry,’’ wrote Hayes in 1879, “we have exhibited less 
originality of invention or construction (than in the cotton and 
woolen branches), and have contented ourselves with copying or 
importing English and French machinery.” ! 

However, the enhancement of productive capacity in the 
American worsted manufacture had been large before 1870. In 
place of combing by hand and of mule-spinning apparatus, which 
had characterized the yarn production in the thirties, now there 
had been substituted the machine combs and the drawing and 
spinning machinery of the modern type. Specially important 
was the introduction of mechanical combs, — the Simpson and 
Lister, and particularly the Noble machines. Hand-combing 
would have proved a decisive constraint upon any considerable 
expansion of the domestic manufacture. Appreciably impor- 
tant, too, from the viewpoint of economy in labor, was the adop- 
tion of frame drawing and spinning. Im all lines the advance 
made for mass production upon quasi-automatic processes. Thus, 
impediments which had stood in the way of extensive domestic 
manufacture of worsted yarn, and so of worsted cloth, were re- 
moved; and the course was already laid for that tremendous growth 
of the worsted industry which came about in succeeding decades.” 

1 American Textile Machinery, p. 53. Hayes attributes the failure of the Ameri- 
can industry to furnish independent advances to the fact that British prohibitions 
upon the exportation of machinery had been removed before the American worsted 
manufacture commenced on any appreciable scale. In the light of numerous im- 
portations from foreign development prior to the removal of these prohibitions 
(1845),—the woolen card, billy, mule, and the like,—the validity of this conten- 
tion is open to serious question. 


2 As to the later advance in worsted spinning technique abroad, we need not 
go into detail. It suffices to note that no important innovation came from do- 


TECHNICAL ADVANCE 363 


In the most important section of wool-cloth production com- 
mon to both branches of the manufacture, that of cloth weaving, 
the developments in the domestic industry prior to 1870 placed 
the American manufacturer in a particularly advantageous posi- 
tion as compared with his situation forty years earlier. Improve- 
ments had made possible more diversified output from mechanical 
weaving, and had also increased the productivity of the weaving 
operation. In this regard, attention has already been given to 
the inventions of William Crompton, — machines which aided 
particularly in the growth of the fancy cassimere and other fancy 
woolen-cloth production.’ Note should now be made of another 
important development. 

While the introduction of Crompton’s machines was proceeding, 
another inventor was coming to the front as a maker of looms, 
one Lucius J. Knowles. In his machines a new variation in loom 
construction was involved.22 The Crompton looms had been 
built upon what is known as the “closed shed”’ principle. This 
meant that with each pick of the shuttle all the harnesses, and 


mestic sources. However, it may be mentioned that apparently by the close of the 
period 1830-1870, perhaps sometime earlier, the machinery of the modern types 
had been elaborated and brought into quite common use abroad. For example, in 
Ure’s Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, etc. (1878), gill-boxes, drawing boxes, and 
roving frames are noted, and the descriptions there given indicate that they had 
already assumed quite the modern form (iv, 984, 988). These machines, however, 
were but improvements on the somewhat similar equipment described by Ure in 
his Philosophy of Manufactures (1835, pp. 151-159) and in Bischoff (ii, 403-404). 

Machine combing was being adopted in England at about the time that the 
worsted industry was making its early strides in the United States. In 1851 there 
were said to have been 12,000 to 14,000 hand-combers in the Bradford district alone, 
and there was a distinct prejudice among manufacturers for hand-combed tops. 
See Dodd, Textile Manufactures, 1851, p. 129; Forbes, Lectures upon the Great 
Exhibition, 1851, p. 316; Killick, Bulletin, 1907, pp. 366-367. However, between 
1851 and 1870 the use of the power-driven combs steadily increased, although, ac- 
cording to Radcliffe, hand-combing continued to be practiced by many until about 
1870 (Woollen and Worsted Yarns, p. 63). See, however, Bowley, Journal of the 
Royal Statistical Society, 1902, p. 109. 

1 See above, pp. 307-300, 313-314. 

2 The Crompton Loom Company always contested the novelty of the Knowles 
contribution, insisting that they had tried out the device and discarded it as un- 
satisfactory. However, Knowles apparently came by his particular idea inde- 
pendently, and was able to embody it in apparatus which has since been of much 
importance in the whole world manufacture of wool. 


364 THE MATURE FACTORY 


so all the threads of the warp, were either raised or depressed; 
and subsequently, after the passage of the shuttle, the “‘shed”’ 
or division of the warp threads was closed, to be reopened in a 
different shed for the succeeding pick. This method of securing 
the shed not only required a large amount of power, but also 
put a considerable strain and wear on the warps through the re- 
peated elevations and depressions. The ‘‘open shed” loom 
patented by Knowles in 1863 aimed at the reduction of these 
disadvantages. Under the “‘open shed” system, a harness once 
raised was maintained in that position perhaps during two or 
three picks, until the demands of the pattern chain occasioned 
its depression.1 This machine, called by Hayes “a marvel of 
ingenuity and mechanical skill,” was a loom specially adapted 
to the wool manufacture. Woolen yarns are weak as compared 
with most other textile yarns, and the open shed relieved the 
warp strands of an appreciable amount of strain. It is signifi- 
cant that, after some years, arrangements were made with an 
important British loom-building concern for the manufacture of 
this loom under lease from the Knowles Loom Works; and that 
by 1893, 10,000 Knowles looms had been placed in the United 
Kingdom and on the Continent.” At the present time, looms of 
the general Knowles type, with modifications of British origin, 
are the chief type of machine employed in England for the weav- 
ing of woolen fabrics. 

Now, one final point. Besides the important improvements 
above considered in cleansing, carding, spinning, and weaving, — 
to which might be added a few advances in the complex finishing 
operations,? — the technical side of the industry has another 
significant aspect in the period before 1870. Then for the first 
time can there be said to have arisen a specialized machine- 

1 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 201. Mr. Knowles had in 1857 
developed a special drop-box mechanism, later incorporated in the Knowles loom, 
which was an important contribution. 

2 Worcester Columbian Tribute, 1893, p. 73. 

3 Reference has already been made to the improvement in printing through the 
change from block to roller method (see above, p. 330). There also were improve- — 
ments in the technique of dyeing, and increase in the size of various finishing ma- 
chines (Bishop, ii, 372, note; Mudge and Hayes, Report on the Paris Exposition of 
1867, pp. 39-44). 





BROAD CAM LOOM WITH DROP BOXES 
As constructed by Mr. George Crompton in the fifties 





NARROW CROMPTON LOOM OF THE FIFTIES 


Showing pattern chain for controlling the harnesses 





TECHNICAL ADVANCE 365 


building industry of the modern sort. Theretofore it had been 
customary for the person or persons responsible for the intro- 
duction or invention of a specific device to undertake its con- 
struction. One will recall that Arthur Scholfield had set up the 
manufacture of carding machines and billies. So, too, the in- 
ventors of the napping and shearing machines, brought out in the 
early years of the century, not infrequently had set up the manu- 
facture of their own inventions. And even in later decades men 
like Goulding and Lucius Knowles organized concerns for the 
construction of their respective innovations. Exceptions to this 
practice with respect to new apparatus were chiefly cases where 
a given small machinist was licensed to build and sell a specific 
piece of machinery, as when Phelps & Bickford of Worcester, 
Massachusetts, were licensed to build the Crompton loom. For 
the manufacture of older machinery, — that which had never 
been patented or for which the patent rights had expired, —a 
multitude of small shops had sprung up. Worcester had early 
become an important center for such small enterprises, but they 
were common in many places where woolen-cloth manufacture 
was largely pursued.! 

These establishments, however, had not been able wholly to 
supply the domestic mills. The latter had been accustomed in 
the early days to build a substantial portion of their necessary 
apparatus, even as the Scholfields had been compelled to do 
when they began. Looms were commonly put together by the 
mechanics employed directly by the mills, or perhaps by the vil- 
lage carpenters and blacksmiths. Thus a woolen and cotton mill 
of East Haddam, Connecticut, in 1819 is reported as having “‘a 
machine room, where all the wood, brass, and iron machinery 
are made and repaired for the establishment.” ? Such individual 
construction was made possible by the relatively simple and light 
character of the early apparatus. Wood was the chief component 
of early machinery, from cards to looms. Wherever special skill 
or the use of steel and heavy iron construction was necessary, a 


1 See files of the Worcester Spy; or Washburn, in History of Worcester County, ii, 
1605-1617. 
2 Field, History of Middlesex County, 1819, p. 78. 


366 THE MATURE FACTORY 


specialized production tended to spring up, as in the manufacture 
of card-clothing, shuttles, the enlarged carding machines, and 
the like. Such production accounts in an important measure for 
the numerous small machine shops of the early thirties. 

The period between 1830 and 1870 witnessed a distinct change. 
With the increased complexity of apparatus, such as the con- 
densers or the new looms, and with the enhanced size of the 
various machines, which required a greater use of metal struc- 
ture, came the substantially complete divorce of wool and ma- 
chine manufacture: wool-working mills gave up their machine 
construction and became dependent upon thespecialized builders 
of textile apparatus. Moreover, the small localized machine 
shops ceased to play so important a réle. As they decreased in 
number, there rose a few large enterprises. ~The Crompton and 
the Knowles loom-building concerns stood out among the pro- 
ducers of that type of machinery. The C. G. Sargent enterprise 
rose to first rank in the manufacture of scouring machines and 
similar preparatory apparatus. And in the New England and 
Philadelphia areas, the concern of Davis & Furber and the Smith 
Woolen Machinery Company grew in domination among the 
producers of carding and spinning machines in their respective 
districts. 

As always with specialization, the development of these larger 
machine-builders spelled increased effectiveness. They stood 
ready to take advantage of suggestions from users of their ma- 
chinery; they maintained a corps of investigators seeking the 
improvement of their own devices; and they served to store up 
the fruits of past experiment and past experience. The place of 
the individual inventor became less important as invention was 
organized, so to speak; but many notable innovations, as the 


1 Hayes, American Textile Machinery, pp. 30-31; publication of the Davis & 
Furber Machine Company entitled ‘‘The Davis & Furber Machine Company and 
the Men who made it” (1908). The latter concern was first brought together in 
1832, and the Smith Woolen Machinery Company (now Smith & Furbush) claims 
a century of continuous existence. 

Another important enterprise in this field was Alfred Jenks & Son of Philadel- 
phia, but like many producers of textile machinery in that region it covers cotton- 
manufacturing apparatus as well as woolen. 


TECHNICAL ADVANCE 367 


automatic looms of the subsequent period, came from their 
workshops. In short, this development presaged continuing ad- 
vance in technical lines, while also suggesting the growing ma- 
turity of the wool-manufacturing industry. 

Summary. Despite the backwardness in certain portions of 
the field, especially in woolen spinning, technical advance in the 
period 1830-1870 had contributed a material forward impulse 
to the domestic wool manufacture. Domestic invention and 
borrowings from abroad, both of great significance, had brought 
that manufacture to a much higher level of productivity 
and effectiveness than it had boasted forty years earlier. These 
improvements had facilitated the introduction of diversified 
production in woolen fabrics, had made feasible the wider ex- 
pansion of the worsted manufacture, and in both the woolen and 
worsted branches of the industry had brought substantial sav- 
ings in labor and in the skill necessary for good quality in output. 
The foundations were being laid for the further extension of 
large-scale production which was to be the conspicuous HELO 
of the period subsequent to 1870. 


CHAPTER XIX 


LABOR AND LABOR CONDITIONS 


DuRING the period between 1830 and 1870 many changes had 
come to the industry and to the country which changed the con- 
ditions of labor within the manufacture. At the earlier date the 
industry shared in that homeliness which has elsewhere been 
pictured for the cotton manufacture with its dormitories, its 
publications, and its relatively high moral tone. The woolen 
mills, to a degree greater than cotton-manufacturing establish- 
ments, were scattered over the country in consequence of their 
search for water power and of their partial dependence upon 
local markets; and small communities centered around the local 
mill were the normal result. Boarding houses were frequently, 
if not commonly, provided for the operatives; and the company’s 
store was a usual feature. Except for a sprinkling of English 
and Irish people, the workers were wholly native. Add to these 
characteristics the small size of the typical mill, — ensuring 
close relationship between employer and employee, —and the 
wage scales sufficient to attract workers into industrial activity, 
and one has a situation smacking of the ideal, at least as com- 
pared with the grimy, overcrowded, and complex mill towns 
of the present day.” 

By 1870 the change to the modern conditions was under way. 
While the industry still showed a rather wide geographical dis- 
tribution, forces were already in action to bring somewhat greater 

1 Abbott, Women in Industry, pp. 113-120; Robinson, Loom and Spindle, pp. 
71 ff.; United States Industrial Commission, vii, 221-223. 

2 Of course, one should not forget the long factory hours. And probably there 
were other equally bad features. The Company store and the truck system were 
sometimes likely to work hardships. The food at the Company boarding houses 
was poor, presumably. Sanitary conditions in the mills unquestionably were bad. 
And the life in such a town doubtless was terribly humdrum. Still I am inclined 


to believe that, taking social as well as economic factors into account, the ad- 
' vantage lay on the side of the old mill village. 


368 


LABOR AND LABOR CONDITIONS 369 


concentration. The fact that already nearly 4o per cent of 
the horse power generated for the mills was from steam boilers 
is indicative of the fact that mills had been emancipated from 
the restraint on location theretofore exercised by water power. 
Plants were now free to localize." Modern conditions were ap- 
pearing in another line, — the beginning in the employment of 
foreign “‘hands” upon any considerable scale. The existence of 
an old and extensive wool manufacture in England had been re- 
sponsible for the attraction to American mills of some English 
immigrants. Such workers seemingly continued to command a 
premium, especially as long as manual skill played an important 
part in certain operations, e. g., jack-spinning and weaving. But 
the proportion of such workers was never large, although as fore- 
men and as operatives in the more skilled occupations they 
played a part in the manufacture which their numbers would 
fail to indicate. In the field of woman labor, the admixture of 
foreign-born was probably less even than in the case of men. In 
the cotton mills of Lowell as late as 1845, there were only 48 
Canadian and 116 Irish women out of a total of 1527 women 
employed in eight establishments; and there is no peculiar reason 
why a somewhat similar proportion should not hold for the larger 
wool manufactories of that period.2, With the Irish famine, how- 
ever, came a substantial increase in the flow of immigrants from 
that island, and a considerable share of the new arrivals sought 
the mill towns. Mr. Harriss-Gastrell in his report of 1873 upon 
the American textile industries speaks of the labor force in our 
cotton mills as chiefly Irish and makes no differentiation between 
the cotton and wool manufactures.? In the Philadelphia area 
surely the establishments contained a goodly proportion of these 


1 By the Census of 1870, the amount of horse power generated in the woolen and 
in the worsted branches was as follows: 


Woolen Mills Worsted Mills 
Water neels) 20. 6265. 2s 59,332 4634 
Peeetere Nees ke 35,900 3382 


2 Lowell as it Was and as it Is, 1845, pp. 165-185. 

3 Report on the Hours of Labour, the Rates of Wage and the progressive Production 
of Cotton and Woolen and other Textile Manufactures in the United States: British 
Documents, 1873 (826). Mr. Harriss-Gastrell also speaks of a sprinkling of French- 
- Canadians. 


370 THE MATURE FACTORY 


new immigrants, — a proportion, however, which was larger in 
the case of men than in that of women.! This influx, too, was of 
more significance than appears on its face. Unlike the small in- 
filtration of immigrants that had preceded, this movement 
brought a marked break in textile labor conditions. Whereas 
earlier the proprietors had been ‘‘almost patriarchal” in their 
‘constant oversight of their native operatives,” now came cer- 
tain changes in American mill towns, dating from these days of 
Irish immigration. Employers had a different feeling, and took 
a different attitude toward all their employees.? Yet it is not 
necessary here to trace this alteration further. One need note 
merely that when the influx of French-Canadians followed upon 
that of Irish, American mill towns were on their way to more 
modern character. Whatever the social effects, this movement 
of immigration meant to the domestic industry some enhance- 
ment of competitive power, in so far as these additions formed a 
more permanent factory class and tended to lower wages, or to 
keep wages from rising, relative to wage levels of the country as 
a whole.® 

Other important changes on the labor side of the industry are 
the increase in the employment of women and children and the 
curtailment of working hours. The point has already been 
made that the early woolen mill called for a particularly large 
proportion of men.* The earliest satisfactory statistics upon the 
wool manufacture pertain to the mills of Massachusetts in 1837. 

1 Statement of Mr. John P. Wood. English and Scotch male workers also made 


up a sizable contingent in Philadelphia mills. 

2 Industrial Commission Report, vii, 221. See also Abbott, Women in Industry, 
Pp. 143-144. 

3 Two odd cases in the type of mill operatives deserve a brief note. In Adams 
County, Mississippi, there was in 1845 a sizable wool and cotton factory — thirty 
hands — employing negro labor alone (29th Cong., 1st Sess., Executive Documents, 
No. 6, p. 676); while the Mission Woolen Mills of San Francisco in the middle six- 
ties apparently employed Chinese labor largely (Report on the Paris Exposition of 
1867, General Survey of the Exposition, p. 103). 

As to the turn-over in the early textile mills, see Batchelder, Early Progress of 
the Cotton Manufacture: ‘The greater part of those at work in the mills were only 
a succession of learners, who left the business as soon as they began to acquire some 
skill and experience.” 

4 See above, pp. 237-238. 

















A MILL-TOWN SCENE OF THE FIFTIES 


Photograph taken in the yard of a company house at Stevens Village, 
North Andover, Massachusetts, some time in the middle fifties 





LABOR AND LABOR CONDITIONS 371 


Divided only between males and females, — no separate figures 
being presented for children, — the proportions were practically 
even: 51 per cent of the former and 49 per cent of the latter. 
Subsequent to that time there was a distinct tendency for the 
proportion of women to decline. In Massachusetts the ratio of 
females had fallen to 41 per cent by 1855, and except in the war 
period did not rise above that point. For the wool industry as a 
whole, the first statistics relate to 1849. At that time females 
composed 42 per cent. Twenty years later, when separate enu- 
meration of children was first made, the ratios among the three 
groups in woolen mills were: men, 53.4 per cent; women, 34.6 
per cent; and children, 12.0 per cent.! The change in propor- 
tions of men and women thus manifested was a result chiefly of 
the technical improvements and of the change in quality of 
product that occurred during these years, though also affected 
by the immigrant movement just noted. Advances in technique, 
such as those in carding and in the processes intermediate be- 
tween carding and spinning, or between spinning and weaving, 
involved the substitution of heavier machines, more highly skilled 
work, or work requiring heavy lifting. The need of woman labor 
tended to decrease. Thus, the burr-cylinder dispensed with the 
burr-pickers who had been women and children; and the use of 
lap or balling intermediate “‘feeds” meant the lifting and moving 
of heavy spools. The improvement in type of output, moreover, 
together with the introduction of superior looms, made a demand 
for adult male labor: the work required more skill and was 
also more exacting. The substitution of fancy cassimere for 
satinet production is a case in point. Finally, the influx of 
immigrant labor was a factor. Through that means Irish or 
French-Canadian men could be substituted with little or no ad- 
vance in cost for native American women.? 


1 These figures exclude the carpet and rug mills. 

2 Not all improvements, however, were in the direction of increasing the use of 
adult male labor. For example, in the processes intermediate between spinning 
and weaving, there was sometimes a simplification of processes which induced the 
larger employment of women. Such was the effect of the warping machine, de- 
scribed as ‘‘an American invention” and as “‘far superior to those used in Great 
Britain.” It signified the substitution of machine work in a process which had pre- 


372 THE MATURE FACTORY 


In the worsted branch, the proportion of female labor was 
even greater than that in the woolen branch. The earliest 
satisfactory figures relate to the Massachusetts worsted mills in 
1855 where the percentage of female employees was 57 per cent. 
In later state censuses of Massachusetts the ratios showed some 
tendency to increase: 68.7 per cent in 1865 and 61.3 per cent in 
1875; although in the 1865 ratio allowance must be made for 
war conditions. For the country as a whole the proportion of 
women was given as about 55 per cent in 1869, and of children 
nearly 15 per cent. Thus at the close of the period now under 
consideration, adult female labor in the worsted branch com- 
prised a substantially higher proportion of the total working 
forces than in the woolen section: 55 per cent as against less 
than 35 per cent; and this difference is of particular importance 
in relation to the comparative advantage of the two branches of 
the industry. The reasons for the variation are not hard to as- . 
certain. ‘The processes in the manufacture of worsted yarns 
were much better suited for female and child labor. In the comb- 
ing operation women could be employed in some measure; in 
the spinning process, the employment of frames instead of mules 
made possible the utilization of women as spinners and children 
as doffers, whereas men and youths were required for supervision 
over woolen mules; while in the finishing operations the elimina- 
tion of fulling, napping, and shearing, where men in the woolen 
mills were chiefly employed, tended in the worsted establish- 
ments to enhance the proportion of women. Being able, then, to 
dispense with a considerable percentage of adult male labor, the 
worsted industry, in 1870 still unsure of its powers, promised to 
attain greater competitive power than the older branch of the 
industry. Under American conditions, the utilization of quasi- 
automatic machinery suitable to the guiding hand of relatively 
less expensive female labor meant a strengthening of the man- 
ufacture against the assaults of competitive domestic goods as 
well as those of competing foreign goods. 


viously been substantially a hand process, and likewise the substitution of female 
for male labor. See Gilroy, Art of Weaving, 1844, p. 332; North, Bulletin, 1902, 
pp. 116-117, 133. 


LABOR AND LABOR CONDITIONS 373 


Beyond changes in the composition of the working forces, 
there was also an important change in duration of the working 
day at wool manufactories. Accounts of mill hours even in the 
middle of the century have a strange ring nowadays. For ex- 
ample, at the Bay State Mills, Lowell, Massachusetts, in 1850, 
“labor begins, or the gate closes, at 5 A.M. from May 1 to Sep- 
tember 1, and at ten minutes before sunrise the remainder of the 
year. A first bell is rung forty minutes before, to allow time to 
prepare for work. Labor ends 7.30 p.m. from September 20 
to March 20; and 7 from May 1 to September 1; and fifteen 
minutes after sunset for the remainder of the year. During the 
whole year dinner is at 12.30 P.M. Forty-five minutes are allowed 
for each meal.”’! Of the smaller mills it was said that “prior to 
1850 it was customary to begin work as soon as there was suffi- 
cient light, even in the long summer days, and to work as late as 
the light would permit, with no fixed regular hours. . . . In the 
short days, or for about six months of the year, it was customary 
to work until 9 o’clock in the evening, beginning early in the 
morning and taking about a half-hour each for breakfast, dinner, 
and supper.” ? Working days, however, began to shorten soon 
after 1850, if in fact the movement had not commenced before. 
A tabulation presented in the Census of 1580 shows a decided 
drift in that direction.? Ten-hour laws had been enacted in 

1 Report of Massachusetts Sanitary Commission, 1850, p. 444. 

2 Mr. William H. Vose of the Fitchburg Woolen Mill Company, in Census of 
1880, XX, Pp. 391. 


3 The tabulation in the Census of 1880 (xx, 375) is of special interest, covering 
the period 1830 to 1880 and mills in various parts of the country: 


to hrs. 10% hrs. rr hrs. t1r%hrs. «2hrs. 1r124%hrs. 13hrs. Suntosun 
1830 : : I 2 
1835 Ay 2 2 
1840 £ 2 2 
1845 I I I 2 
1850 ae Pe 2 I 2 I 2 
1855 “7 af, 7 ; 2 I I 
1860 2 6 I 2 I 
1865 "4 I 13 3 2 Aa : 
1870 8 2 16 4 I : 2 
1875 13 2 15 3 hie 2 
1880 12 2 17 2 : 2 


See also Aldrich, Report on Wholesale Prices, Wages, and Transportation (52nd 
Cong., 2nd Sess., Senate Report, No. 1394), i, 178-179; Report on Woman and Child 
Wage Earners, ix, 69-72. 


374 THE MATURE FACTORY 


several important industrial states prior to 1855, — New Hamp- 
shire, Maine, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Rhode Island, — 
and though these early laws were not efficiently administered, 
they undoubtedly had an influence upon mill practice. By 1870 
the typical factory was running from 7 A.M. to 7 P.M. with an 
hour out for dinner, or really an eleven-hour working day. 
Finally, it is possible here to secure some general view of the 
improving condition of the wage-earners apart from the reduc- 
tion in number of working hours. In actual wages, to be sure, 
such data as are available do not indicate any appreciable im- 
provement that was not shared by workers in other branches of 
the textile industry and by workers in all other industries. In- 
deed, the advance in wages over the decade of the fifties seems to 
have been rather greater in these other lines than in the wool 
manufacture; and after the close of the Civil War the reaction 
appears to have been less considerable. However, the progress 
in the woolen industry was never much out of line with that else- 
where, — the industry felt general conditions acutely.1 Yet from 
another angle the progress of the operatives in the wool manufac- 
ture is more evident. Wages paid in the woolen industry in- 
creased approximately 180 per cent between 1859 and 1869; 
whereas the “‘value added by manufacture”’ within the industry 
(value of products minus value of raw materials) increased only 
133 per cent. In the younger worsted manufacture much the 
same change occurred: wages paid rose to eight-fold their earlier 
figure, while value added by manufacture rose but little over six- 
fold. To some degree these diversities of movement reflect 
merely the peculiar position of the wool-manufacturing industry 
in the years following the Civil War, — the severe competition 
in an overextended manufacture, continued higher importations, 
and the like. At least, there is a prima facie case that profits 
rather than wages were bearing the brunt of the difficulties.” 
On the whole, the conditions of labor from the viewpoint of 
the worker himself had substantially improved in the decades 


1 See indices of wage changes in Aldrich Report, Pt. I, 173-174. 

2 In this period there was a beginning of welfare work by the better managed 
and more prosperous mills. See Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 202; 
and Hayes, Report on the Exhibition of 1876, p. 64. 


LABOR AND LABOR CONDITIONS 375 


before 1870, with the shorter hours and higher wages. The cur- 
tailment in working hours has a particularly modern aspect, as 
also has the beginning of the flow of immigrants into the mills. 
In these factors as well as in the proportions of men and women 
in the manufacture, the industry was moving toward the condi- 


tions of the present time. The picture of the years around 1870 
shows the industry in transition. 


CHAPTER XX 
THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 


THE period of the Civil War, like that of the War of 1812, forms 
an important episode in the history of the American wool man- 
ufacture. In both cases there was a marked expansion of the 
industry due in greater or less degree to interrupted commerce; 
in both, there came an increase in the diversity of domestic pro- 
duction; and in both, there followed a difficult period of enforced 
readjustment within the industry, incidental to which arose a 
demand for, and ultimately the enactment of, a more “‘adequate”’ 
protective tariff on wool manufactures. The character of the 
American industry and the circumstances surrounding it were 
substantially changed as a result of war-time experience. 
However, striking as are the similarities in the two cases, the 
differences are equally notable. With respect to causation: one 
may observe that the weight to be assigned the interruption of 
preéxisting commercial relations as a cause of industrial change 
differs in the two instances: in the one case, chief interest at- 
taches to this factor, but in the other only that of one among 
several important influences.!. The military demands in 1861- 
1865 played a more considerable part than they had in 1812- 
1815. Inflation of the currency through the issuance of the 
Greenbacks gave a special impetus to industrial activity in 
the Civil War period. And, then, the peculiar conditions in the 
cotton industry at that time, — the force of the “‘cotton famine,” 
— drew particular attention of the whole textile industry to the 
manufacture of wool. Secondly, as far as results are concerned: 
the influence of the two episodes on the subsequent tariff changes 
was materially different. In the one case, protection was re- 
sorted to with some hesitation and imposed in only a very 
1 Interruption of commerce in the Civil War period came chiefly as the result of 


deliberate legislative action, the increase of tariff duties enacted mainly for fiscal 
purposes. 


376 


THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD S77, 


moderate measure; whereas at the later date protection was 
confidently demanded by the domestic industry, was developed 
in all the modern formule of ‘‘compensatory duties,” ‘‘pro- 
tective duties,” and the like, and was elevated to a plane of 
effective power which had not been dreamed of in the pre-war 
period. On account of these peculiarities of the Civil War 
experience, the events of that troubled decade deserves special 
consideration. 

The enlarged requirements of the war came upon the woolen 
branch of the industry — which alone was seriously affected — 
after this branch had just passed through a decade of restricted 
growth, only partly relieved by the modification in tariff matters 
effected through the act of 1857.1 For a time the War Depart- 
ment experienced difficulty in securing adequate supplies of uni- 
form cloth, blankets, flannels, and the like, being compelled to 
resort to appreciable purchases in England and France.? Soon, 
however, domestic mills got into war production, until by 1864 
the consumption of wool exceeded 60 million pounds for the 
army goods alone, that is, exclusive of requirements for the navy, 
cartridges, and the like.* At that time, consumption for mili- 
tary demands equaled something like a third of the total domestic 
consumption of wool fiber. ' 

Expansion in the industry as a whole, however, proceeded at 
great rapidity and quite independently of the direct war needs. 
Measured in wool consumption, the number of establishments, 
or number of employees, the increase in productive capacity 
was proportionately greater than in subsequent decades, and 
particularly great as compared with the advance in the decade 
just preceding. In terms of quantities, such as those already sug- 

1 That is, by the readjustment of the relation between duties on raw material 
and finished goods. 

2 Census of 1860, iii, p. xxxiv; Fite, Social and Industrial Conditions during the 
Civil War, p. 83. Fite narrates that complaint arose in consequence of the foreign 
purchases: that the government should patronize home industries; but when it 
bought any cloth obtainable, of any color, Union soldiers shot one another in the 
woods of the battlefields. 

3 Hayes, Fleece and the Loom, 1865, pp. 46-47; Fite, op. cit., p. 84. Fite puts 


the annual military consumption of wool at the height of the war, at 75 million 
pounds. 


279 THE MATURE FACTORY 


gested, the industry doubled in size — indeed, rather more than 
doubled — between 1859 and 1869.1 At the peak of production 
during the war, total domestic consumption of wool probably 
ran as high as 200 million pounds, as compared with 71 million 
pounds in 1849 and 86 million in 1859, or with 189 million in 1869.? 
Apparently, after a particularly rapid expansion during the first 
half of the decade 1859-1869, there was some recession before 
its close. | 

Typical of the experience of individual firms under the forces 
making for expansion was that of the Sawyer Woolen Mills of 
Dover, New Hampshire. Before 1860 the property consisted of 
two small establishments, operating on flannels, each of two-set 
capacity. In that year one of the mills was increased to four sets; 
and again in 1863 enlarged to eight sets; while in these years the 
old machinery had been replaced by new and improved ap- 
paratus. The mills ran on flannels until 1866, when they changed 
over to fancy cassimeres and similar cloths.? The Pacific Mills 
started with 1000 looms in 1853, but by the close of the Civil 
War had grown to a weaving capacity of 3500 looms.* Between 
July, 1862, and December 31, 1863, according to estimates by 
the Boston Board of Trade, 1000 sets of woolen machinery had 
been added to the previous power of the North.® The effects were 
still visible as late as 1869 when the Census of that year reported 
marked increases in the number of establishments as compared 
with 1859: in the woolen branch, an increase from 1260 to 2891, 


1 The actual statistics, some of which have been already produced, are as 
follows: 


Woolen Mills Worsted Mills 
Lbs. of Wool Lbs. of Wool 
No. of No. of Consumed No. of No. of Consumed 
Year Estabs. Employees (millions) Estabs. Employees (millions) 
18490 15590 30,352 70.9 ay Sache egies 
1859 1260 41,350 83.6 3 2,378 3.0 
1869 2801 80,053 172.1 102 12,920 17.1 


Figures based on value are, of course, vitiated by the decrease in the value of the 
immediate monetary standard, Greenbacks; and, accordingly, I have not attempted 
to use them. 

2 Hayes, Fleece and the Loom, p. 47; Fite, op. cit., p. 84. 

3 Awards and Claims, Exhibition of 1876, p. 200. 

¢ Clark, p. 453. 

5 Report of the Board, 1864, p. 115. 


THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 379 


and in the worsted branch from a dozen (the Census gives three) 
to 102. 

Among the accessions to the growing list of wool-manufactur- 
ing ventures was an astonishingly large group of concerns erst- 
while engaged in the working of cotton. The cotton mills of the 
country were much perplexed when war supervened and market 
supplies of cotton vanished overnight. Partly influenced by the 
sentiment that there would be “peace in sixty days,” several of 
the mills closed their doors, dismissed their operatives, and sold 
their stocks of cotton. But thereafter their troubles were mani- 
fold. Finding it impossible to get back to profitable cotton 
manufacture, or attracted by the high profits expected in the 
manufacture of wool under the abnormal war demands, a num- 
ber of such concerns, including the Suffolk, Hamilton, and Tre- 
mont Companies, changed all or part of their equipment to the 
production of woolen goods.! The Wanskuck Mills at Provi- 
dence, and the Lippitt Woolen Company at Woonsocket, Rhode 
Island, also came into the wool manufacture at this time. In 
both instances, cotton mills were purchased by new adventurers 
and converted to the production of wool goods.” Never before 
nor since were there so many shifts from one branch to another 
of the textile industry in so limited a time. For the present pur- 

1 Cowley, History of Lowell, 1868, pp. 48-61, who voices severe criticism of the 
action of the cotton mills, especially of the Lowell concerns. Speaking of the Merri- 
mack Company, which had been started in 1822 by Nathan Appleton, he says: 
During the war, this concern ‘showed great ‘lack of sagacity and forethought’ 
(Report of the Committee of the Proprietors, 1863) — in stopping their mills — in dis- 
missing their employees — in discontinuing the purchase of cotton — and in selling 
their fabrics at a slight advance on their peace prices, and at less than the actual 
cost of similar fabrics at the time of sale. . . . Instead of boldly running, as com- 
panies elsewhere did, they took counsel of their fears. . . . 

“The blunders of this company were naturally copied by others — the younger 
companies being accustomed to ‘dress’ on the Merrimack. In this instance, the 
blunders of the older company were not only copied, but exaggerated and intensi- 
fied to a fatal degree. The other cotton companies actually sold out their cotton, 
and several of them made abortive experiments in other branches of manufacture, 
by which they incurred losses, direct and indirect, exceeding the amount of their 
entire capital” (p. 48). 

See also Webber, Manual of Power, p. 64. 


2 Letter from Wanskuck Company; Richardson, History of Woonsocket, p. 141; 
and Bulletin, 1891, p. 264. 


380 THE MATURE FACTORY 


pose, however, the most important feature was the added pro- 
ductive capacity in the wool manufacture which came about in 
this manner. 

Another factor which induced this marked expansion in num- 
ber of establishments and in total manufacturing capacity, and 
one of the most influential, was the high level of profits secured 
by the preéxisting enterprises. ‘‘Profits were enormous,” says 
Fite, and in fact they attained proportions which not only con- 
trasted sharply with the low range during the preceding decade 
but set a high-water mark, at least until the period of the World 
War. One manufacturer was reported a few months after the 
outbreak of the war to have made $200,000; and another was 
making $2000 a day.! The Pontoosuc Manufacturing Com- 
pany, whose net profits had averaged a little over $20,000 in the 
ten years 1851-1860, reaped gains of $107,000 in the three years 
1863-1865.” The stockholders in the Pacific Mills, Lawrence, 
Massachusetts, who in 1853 had invested $2,500,000 in the con- 
cern, drew out in dividends before 1867 — and almost wholly in 
the war period — $3,000,000; in addition to which a consider- 
able quantity of earnings had been put back into the business, 
and the treasurer in 1867 had on hand “‘a very large amount” of 
undivided profits.? A composite schedule of dividend payments 
from those companies whose records are available shows an in- 
crease from approximately an average of 9 per cent, during the 
eight years preceding the war, to one of 27% per cent in 1865. 

To a considerable degree, these returns were in a special mean- 
ing “‘paper’’ profits, inasmuch as the rise of prices consequent on 
the issue of the Greenbacks gave special facility to the registering 
of nominal gains. The price of wool was steadily rising for sev- 
eral years: domestic fleece wool for example increasing from 35- 
48 cents per pound in April, 1861 to 90-117 cents per pound in 
August, 1864. The case of Mr. Blackinton, proprietor of the 
Blackinton Woolen Company, North Adams, Massachusetts, is 
illustrative of the gains that arose through the appreciation of 


1 London Economist, December 14, 1861; quoted in Fite, p. 84. 

* Records of the Company. Dividends which had averaged $17,400 in the 
decade of the fifties, reached an average of $88,000 in the three years 1864-1866. 

3 Report on the Exposition of 1867, vi, 130. 


THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 381 


raw-material values. At about the time when war seemed in- 
evitable, he heard of a big block of wool in central New York 
State, some 23,000 pounds. He bought it at once, paying 50 
cents a pound. Before it was worked up, its value had doubled.! 
“In a majority of instances,” said the Special Commissioner of 
the Revenue in 1869, “‘the large profits realized by the woolen 
manufacturers from 1863 to 1866 were due rather to the rise in 
the price of their raw material than to any legitimate profits de- 
rived from the manufacture and sale of their productions.” ? 
However, whether the source of profits was merely inflated wool 
prices or not, their realization unquestionably provided a direct 
stimulus to the enlargement of old plants and to the establish- 
ment of new enterprises in this field. 

A third important factor, which was instrumental in attract- 
ing capital to that field, was the increasing import duties on wool 
fabrics. The Morrill act of 1861 had made a substantial advance 
over the tariffs of 1846 and 1857; but the rates were destined to 
go yet higher. Moreover, the frame-work of the duties carried 
in the war-time laws is significant as foreshadowing the modern 
type of duties on wool goods. The decade began with the Morrill 
act, which imposed a tax of 12 cents a pound plus 25 per cent ad 
valorem upon all cloths and dress-goods. By 1864 the duty upon 
goods coming in as ‘‘cloths’”’ had been advanced to 24 cents per 
pound and either 40 or 45 per cent ad valorem, according to the 
value of the fabric, while for dress-goods a more complicated 
schedule provided rates running from 4 cents per square yard 
and 25 per cent ad valorem to 6 cents per square yard and 35 
per cent ad valorem. The ad valorem rates were intended as the 
only true protective duties. The specific rates were conceived as 
mere compensation to domestic manufacturers for the enhance- 
ment in the price of their raw material due to the duties levied 
on wool. As will appear in the discussion of the Woolens act of 
1867, these compensatory duties to be sure carried a substantial 
amount of incidental or concealed protection. Yet, apart from 


1 Interview with Mr. Archer, who in 1915 had been connected fifty-eight years 
with the Blackinton Woolen Company. 
2 Bulletin, 1870-1871, p. 3. 


382 THE MATURE FACTORY 


such protection, the assistance extended by the ad valorem rates 
alone was obviously much increased during these war years.! 
The action of this rising protection is evident in the course of 
importations. For example, wool “cloths”? which had been 
brought in to the value of 10.9 million dollars per year during 
the period 1856-1860 were imported in the next five years to less 
than half that amount per annum; and imports of blankets 
showed a similar movement. Even the course of dress-goods 
importations was affected temporarily. Their value per year fell 
in the corresponding periods from 14.5 millions to 8.6 millions. 
An opportunity in the American market was thus offered domestic 
producers, which they were not slow to take. 

The era of abnormally high profits and of increasingly high 
protection which the war induced had two striking effects, — two 
effects, it may be remarked, which appeared again during the 
somewhat similar period of the World War.” First, there was a 
distinct tendency toward the production of fine-quality goods. 
In the woolen branch, superior beavers, coatings, chinchilla 
cloakings, and fine French and Scotch cassimeres are spoken of 
as among the new departments essayed in these years. Opera 
flannels and flannel suitings whose production was initiated just 
prior to 1860 secured an appreciable manufacture only during 
the Civil War era. Similarly the line of finer worsted fabrics — 
Italian cloths, poplins of worsted and mohair, cashmeres, and 
the like — was a by-product of the abnormal war conditions. 
Mr. Erastus B. Bigelow, speaking in 1869, said with some ex- 
aggeration, “‘Ten years ago our manufacturers had attempted 
scarcely anything beyond common goods of the coarser kinds. 
Now they produce almost every variety of wool fabric in general 
use.” Of that specially important cloth so largely produced in 


1 A part of this additional “protective” rate was imposed to compensate do- 
mestic manufacturers for the 10 per cent excise tax payable on their productions. 
However, here too was some concealed or. incidental protection, since the latter 
could be paid in the depreciated Greenbacks, while import duties had to be paid in 
gold. 

* The results in neither case were clear during the period of conflict itself. The 
early post-war years should be embraced in the same general intervals, as they 
revealed in both cases the forces which were striving for assertion during the actual 
war periods. 


THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 383 
Millions of dollars 





Fic. 11. Importation of Cloths and Dress-goods (in terms of value), 
1859-1870. 


the United States, cassimere, he stated that “in no market of 
the world could better cassimeres be found than some of those” 
turned out in American mills. Again, the report of the House 


1 Address at the Exhibition of the American Institute in New York, 1869, pp. 5-6. 


384 THE MATURE FACTORY 


Committee on Manufactures asserted in 1870: “The distinctly 
fine goods (both woolen and worsted) are almost all the growth 
under the tariffs since 1861.”’1 While such a development was 
perhaps a normal one under the circumstances, it did bequeath a 
problem to the legislators in the post-war period. In the tech- 
nical, labor, and market conditions surrounding the wool manu- 
facture of that time, manufacture along such lines was not so 
well fitted to the American industry as the production of more 
common fabrics. Domestic producers were likely to seek pro- 
tection from foreign competitors at least as great as that under 
which the newer departments of manufacture had developed; 
and the measure of protection necessary for support of these 
newer ventures would probably be taken as the minimum for the 
whole industry. 

Again, the abnormal period through which the industry had 
passed left the manufacture with a substantially overexpanded 
equipment. The statistics of growth already presented indicate 
a much more rapid expansion than the increase of population, 
while the course of importations does not indicate a change in 
the sharing of the domestic market between American and foreign 
producers sufficient to take care of the increased domestic capac- 
ity. There was, to be sure, some small increase in the size of the 
domestic market beyond that supplied by the advance of popu- 
lation, derived from the continued encroachment of the factory 
upon the household system; but on the other hand that market 
was for a time contracted by the impoverishment of the southern 
states. Even the northern market was adversely affected by 
post-war conditions, e. g., by the sale of the government’s surplus 
army supplies. The quartermaster of the army, it is reported, 

1 Bulletin, 1870, p. 145. 

Another interesting and perhaps inevitable development during the peculiar 
period of the war was the decline in efficiency of production, — a phenomenon re- 
marked in England and the United States during the years of the World War. In 
1867 it was noted as regards the United States that ‘‘during the war, the standard 
of excellence in our goods was undoubtedly far too low, and discredit was thrown 
upon our national production.” This was, however, only a temporary condition, 
remedied by the forces of keener competition in the subsequent years. See Hayes 
and Mudge, Report on the Exposition of 1867, vi, 22; North, in Bulletin, 1895, 
p. 42. 


THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 385 


disposed of ‘‘an immense amount of military clothing,” includ- 
ing over 2 million overcoats, nearly a million blankets, and more 
than 2% million articles of clothing. Horace Greeley wore the 
uniform of blue cloth and brass buttons for many years there- 
after; and the old army overcoats became the customary garb 
of city cabmen. Even today an overcoat of similar design is 
still to be seen upon the fast-disappearing race of cabmen in some 
sections of the country.! At least, it is sure that no enlargement 
in the domestic consuming power for new goods had occurred 
which would accommodate the marked enhancement of produc- 
tive facilities. Bigelow put the case briefly in an address de- 
livered in 1869: having noted the war-time scarcity of cotton 
and the effects of the military demand, he found the effect was 
‘greatly to stimulate the growing and manufacturing of wool. 
. . . The wool-manufacturing ability of this country was in- 
creased with a rapidity and to an extent wholly unknown before. 
Cotton mills were converted into woolen mills, and new estab- 
lishments sprang up as if by magic in many parts of the United 
States. And now we behold the natural — I think I may say'the 
inevitable — result, namely, the amount of production which is 
largely ahead of the demand. Though the machinery in opera- 
tion was no more than the imperative needs of the war required, 
it far exceeds the normal demand in time of peace.’”’? Indeed, in 
that year a depression in the wool manufacture occurred which 
was attributed to overproduction within the industry.2 Nor, 
apparently, was readjustment attained in all lines for a consider- 
able period. Overproduction in the blanket section of the in- 
dustry, caused by the war-time entry of many small producers 


1 On amount of clothing sold, see Stanwood, American Tariff Controversies, ii, 
169. 

2 Bigelow, E. B., Address at the Exhibition of the American Institute at New York, 
pp. 10-12. See also Bulletin, 1869, p. 293. North (Bulletin, 1895, p. 44) says that 
‘for several years (after the war) the wool manufacture suffered the usual conse- 
quences of over-production,”’ though in his opinion less seriously than after the 
War of 1812, both because the country grew rapidly and because the tariff checked 
imports. 

3 Bulletin, 1870, p. 24. Here it is stated: ‘‘We have authority for the assertion 
that in eight years our production of woolen manufactures has increased 150 per 
cent, while our population has advanced only 30 per cent.” 


386 THE MATURE FACTORY 


upon that manufacture and by their continued operation subse- 
quently, is said to have led to a “glut” in the market and to a 
large auction sale in New York City as late as 1878.1 

The influence of these two war-time developments in the wool 
manufacture was manifested in several ways. We may note first 
the diminution of profits which oppressed the industry for a 
number of years. The Pontoosuc Manufacturing Company 
which had enjoyed a profit of $225,000 in 1865 found its net 
earnings reduced the succeeding year to $13,000, while in 1867 
and 1868 the balance sheet indicated losses averaging over 
$5,000 each year.” The Arlington Mills after a series of prosperous 
war years underwent a reorganization in 1869.° Five relatively 
large and strong companies were compelled to decrease their 
dividend payments on the average by half from the high level 
of 1864-1866, and probably these were in part paid out of the 
war profits. It is likely, too, that the general run of concerns 
through the country suffered much more severe reverses. Fur- 
thermore, the reaction after the war went to strengthen the 
forces of concentration and localization within the industry, as 
will appear in consideration of the subsequent period; while 
seemingly it also went to stimulate the introduction of improved 
technical equipment, some of which was already known in the 
manufacture, e. g., the Knowles and Crompton looms.* Finally, 
the situation engendered “‘the natural — I think I may say the 
inevitable — result,’’ a demand for higher protection. Probably 
the whole manufacturing industry was interested and involved 
in greater or less degree as a consequence of general overproduc- 
tion; and surely the recently acquired portions of the manufac- 
ture, as I have already suggested, were particularly concerned, 
because of their special weaknesses. A ‘‘ National Association 
of Wool Manufacturers” had been organized in 1864. By its 
initiative a convention of wool growers and wool manufacturers 
was held at Syracuse, New York, in December, 1865, ‘“‘for the 


1 Bulletin, 1881, p. 386. See also auction of flannels, Hayes, Awards and Claims 
at the International Exhibition of 1876, p. 338. 

2 Records of the Company. 

3 The Arlington Mills: An Historical and Descriptive Sketch, 1891, p. 35. 

4 See above, pp. 307-309, 313-314, 363-365. 


THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 387 


purpose of consultation in relation to their mutual interests, es- 
pecially as to the representations to be given respecting the wool- 
producing and wool-manufacturing interests before the United 
States Tariff and Revenue Commission.’! Little or nothing 
was said at that time regarding the condition of the manufactur- 
ing industry, but when in the spring of 1867 the project of a 
general tariff revision was lost, complaint of the “‘depressed con- 
dition”’ in the manufacture was frequent. The worsted branch 
was alleged to be ‘“‘prostrated,”’ because the Canadian reciprocity 
treaty had been allowed to run out (thereby closing the door to 
the free entry of combing wools), and yet nothing else had been 
done for the new industry.? As to the wool manufacture gen- 
erally, it was stated that ‘‘many small mills have stopped run- 
ning,” and that “‘the larger ones have been run on as short time 
as they could be without breaking-up, scattering, and driving 
into other pursuits that skilled operative labor which will be 
necessary when they can find remunerative markets.”’? As a 
result of such argument and of the persistent representation of 
their needs by the delegates of the two interests, a special act 
was formulated and passed, the Wool and Woolens act of 1867. 
The only manufacture which took precedence over that of wool 
was the production of cigars and tobacco, increased rates upon 
these articles having been granted by Congress in the summer 
of 1866. Referring to the special consideration given these two 
manufactures, tobacco and wool, Mr. Hayes, secretary of the 
new National Association of Wool Manufacturers, in 1867 made 
the striking comment: ‘‘The outposts of protection have been 
won by provision for the most suffering industries.” * Indeed, 
as far as wool is concerned the act of 1867 marks the definite ex- 
tension of wool and wool-fabric protection to new areas. It con- 
solidated the rising level of rates secured during the Civil War 


1 See the letter calling the convention: Report of the Proceedings of the Conven- 
tion, p. 6. 

2 Third Annual Report of the National Association of Wool Manufacturers, 1867, 
Deals. 

3 Ibid., p. 23; quoting from an article by Mr. Henry S. Randall in the Rural New- 
Yorker, an agricultural paper. 

4 Ibid., p. 14. 


388 THE MATURE FACTORY 


period. More than that, it denotes the beginning of a new era 
in the wool manufacture, a new basis of international relations, 
since reductions in subsequent tariffs from the level attained in 
1867 have been but temporary and partial. We have never re- 
turned to the relatively low tariff duties which characterized the 
period before the Civil War. In short, this heritage of the war 
forms a turning point in the history of the American wool manu- 
facture. On the side of tariff policy, as in character of produc- 
tion, geographical distribution, or other features connected with 
the wool-manufacturing industry, the decades after 1870 form a 
distinct period. 


CHAPTER XXI 
CONCLUSION — THE INDUSTRY IN 1870 


THE foregoing discussion has traced the development of the 
American wool manufacture during the period 1830-1870 in 
various aspects. To some extent the argument in the several 
chapters has perforce been individually distinct, despite efforts 
to tie the story together. Accordingly, there is reason to pause 
before entering upon an analysis of the more recent decades, in 
order to survey the advances which were made in the forty-year 
period before 1870, and to ascertain more generally the real 
situation in the latter year. In what chief features did the 
American wool manufacture of 1870 differ from that of 1830, and 
what were the tendencies of the development? 

As the title of this Part suggests, the factory, in my opinion, 
had reached maturity by 1870. As an industrial form, the wool 
factory in 1830 had been a new phenomenon, and in many ways 
had showed this status. Frequently the new-sprung mills had 
relied upon outside aid of various sorts to help sustain their posi- 
tions. If they did not commonly employ labor outside their 
walls, they often supplemented their own manufacture by taking 
in carding, spinning, and other work from quasi-household pro- 
ducers. Nor were cases rare in which the mills depended largely 
upon the strictly local markets, sometimes even exchanging 
finished cloth for wool or other supplies. Now by 1870 this situa- 
tion had changed. For a large and growing section of the indus- 
try — that is, barring the western mills — establishments were 
as self-dependent as they are today. The transformation of dirty 
and greasy wool into finished fabrics was carried through wholly 
inside the factory walls; and the disposal of the production was 
achieved through a broad and well-organized marketing system. 

The factory had also gained a very considerable improvement 
in manufacturing technique. Except for the apparatus of the 


389 


390 THE MATURE FACTORY 


spinning process, the machinery and methods had become ex- 
traordinarily like those of the present time. Advance in scour- 
ing and in weaving was perhaps most striking in this period. In 
the one case, hand work with crude and inaccurate methods was 
being replaced by practices and apparatus which allowed for 
more satisfactory and quasi-automatic treatment of the raw 
wool. In the case of weaving, the period opened with the plain 
loom alone in operation, — and a slow and confining mechanism 
it was. A very limited range of weave-designs was possible; and 
its speed would today be considered a snail’s pace. By 1870 the 
industry possessed several notable types of apparatus, — looms 
equipped with closed-shed and open-shed warp control, with 
drop boxes, and the like, — and this apparatus could be driven 
at particularly increased rapidity. 

Such improvements not only made for more effective domestic 
manufacture, but they tended toward production on a larger 
unit scale of operations. Even before the Civil War this move- 
ment toward larger scale of operation had begun; and one could 
say — having in mind a certain range of establishments in the 
East — that “‘the largest textile factories in America before 1860 
made woolen goods.” ! The existence of many small woolen 
concerns in the West and South, as well as some small mills scat- 
tered in the East, would prevent the conclusion that woolen mills 
in 1860 generally were large affairs. But some establishments, 
such as that of the Middlesex Mills, were leading the way; and 
the course seemed set for the further growth of similar plants in 
the eastern regions, with the gradual undercutting and elimina- 
tion of the country’s small concerns. Increased concentration of 
the trade in raw wool, development of subsidiary industries, 
greater attention to medium qualities of manufacture, and im- 
proved systems of cloth distribution, — these all tended to 
stimulate the movement toward large-scale enterprise. 

But if the self-dependence of the mill operation, the improve- 
ments in technique, and the development of production by cer- 
tain concerns to a substantially large-scale basis spelled a real 
maturity in the producing factory, the industry itself was still 

ti Clarks 304 bas 


CONCLUSION — THE INDUSTRY IN 1870 391 


showing signs of the gauchy youth. It lacked much of the ma- 
turity and stability which one may find in it at the present time. 
Assuredly, the rapid disappearance of the household manufac- 
ture and diversification in type of production which came about 
in the decades between 1830 and 1870 were important steps in 
this direction. So also were the moderate development of the 
wholesale clothing industry and the full bloom of the “‘regular”’ 
cloth-distributing system. But the end was still far off. 

As yet the industry was scattered widely through the country, 
local conditions of water power and the like impeding the ten- 
dency toward concentration within a particular area. Again, the 
representative establishment was still an affair of moderate 
size, at least as compared with more modern standards; and it 
was still chiefly an isolated concern, — except in so far as common 
connection with other establishments through a common selling 
agency gave such an establishment membership in a larger group 
of producers. No tendency toward combination or consolida- 
tion obtained in appreciable degree. Furthermore, the character 
of the labor force in the industry was in process of change. Im- 
migrant help was increasing in proportion, but the conditions of 
recent years were still unknown. The old situation with a work- 
ing force virtually complete of native Americans was gone; but 
the situation with such a force made up largely and consistently 
of foreign workmen had not yet appeared. Finally the character 
of the industry’s output was by no means fully modernized. 
Some diversification of factory production, to be sure, had oc- 
curred, but in various respects maturity was lacking. For in- 
stance, a part of the newer manufacture — that of worsted 
fabrics — had not as yet become well rooted. Here the real 
multiplication in type of production had not come by 1870; the 
industry was still too widely scattered; and it was carried on in 
too small establishments. Again, neither in the woolen nor 
worsted manufactures had any notable standardization of prod- 
ucts arisen, — barring perhaps standardization in the flannel 
and blanket ends of the industry. Yet standardization of pro- 
duction is one of the chief features of the modern manufacture. 
The expansion of the wholesale clothing industry had been a de- 


392 THE MATURE FACTORY 


velopment which before 1870 had exerted a stimulus in this 
direction; but by that date the wholesale manufacture of men’s 
clothing was in no such position as today, and work in the pro- 
duction of women’s wool garments had hardly begun. 

In closing, we may note that some of the features met with in ~ 
the study of conditions around 1870 were the result of peculiar 
circumstances affecting that year or the years immediately pre- 
ceding. For example, there was an excessive manufacturing 
capacity in the industry and a particularly high quality of out- 
put, resulting from the abnormal war situation. And closely 
tied with this consideration are the tariff position and the exist- 
ing trend of importations. The tariff had lately been fixed at a 
level that was distinctly elevated compared with any legislation 
which had preceded it, and especially compared with the laws 
enforced in the latter forties and the fifties. This new height was 
the effect partly of the war conditions and partly of the circum- 
stances in the industry which were themselves due to the war. 
On the other hand, the import movement was entering upon a 
new phase. The entrance of foreign cloths had been notably 
great in the period of the fifties, both in absolute volume and in 
terms of consumption per capita; but the rise of importation in 
the later sixties, particularly with respect to dress-goods, had 
been a new movement, and by 1870 the top was reached. One 
awaited intimation as to the exact course that importations, 
affected in greater or less degree by the height of the tariff wall, 
would take in the subsequent decades. 

The period 1830-1870 was an era of real growth, — a growth 
perhaps not so striking as in the decades before or afterwards, 
yet very substantial. In view of certain difficulties which hedged 
the industry about through part or the whole of this period, — 
lack of standardized output, tariff conditions, and the like, — 
the advance is all the more significant of the industry’s vigor. 











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